The Dragon's Lullaby
by candycoatedmonster
Summary: Azula is in utter agony at first; the rending of herself and the creation of another makes her twist and writhe in searing pain, but when she wakes up the world is on fire... and it is so beautiful. [DragonMother!Azula AU] [Slowburn Tyzula]
1. Prologue

_**AN:**_ _Because I can't really live without Azula as a Dragon!Mother.  
T/M for future sexual content, some violence and mature topics.  
This is _very _AU, by way of_ _ **extreme**_ _canon divergence, but everything up until the beginning of this story completely canon compliant (edit: except I wrote it before Smoke and Shadow). It picks up right after_ The Search _(after the in-medias-res prologue)._

* * *

 _ **The Dragon's Lullaby**_

* * *

 **Prologue**

* * *

Political disputes are not the only ramifications losing balance for a century.

The rebuilding involves more than apologizing, imprisoning and redrawing the lines of who owns what. This became very evident after the war, when forests and rivers were forgotten and the focus shifted to angry kings and old grudges. The unification of humans was very easily destroyed by the eternal union of spirits and the spurned, and now, after a war that lasted One Hundred Years, there is another.

Now, there has been a shift in the spirits. Something inexplicable and devastating to the carefully rebuilt world around them. While there is so much fire consuming the countryside, creatures of destruction, it is very easy to see the fact that it is a world being reborn in fire.

If it were not being led by Azula, it would be so easy to emphasize with the cause. If her first action had not been to seize Caldera and make herself a fortress, using dragons to make herself untouchable, maybe this would have been seen as an act of justice.

See, when Azula got lost, she got found, and somehow managed to bring living creatures of nightmare back from the Spirit World with her.

And now Ty Lee stands in front of Zuko, her husband of several years, and they are both alone and separated from their friends. Aang vanished into the Spirit World as soon as Azula took Caldera, and he hasn't come back yet. It is impossible to figure out where anyone else is in this nightmarish regime, but the _former_ Fire Lord and Fire Lady are hiding in the woods where they once got lost with Azula and Mai as kids.

Azula and Mai, who are in the Fire Nation palace. With dragons. With _fucking dragons_. Who can overthrow a tyrant with _dragons_ at her disposal?

Zuko sniffs in the cool breeze and shifts his weight uncomfortably. "I think you're the best chance we have right now, since everyone we've tried to contact hasn't said a word back. You go to her and do something sweet and... sexy."

"She wouldn't trust me. She wouldn't trust me in a million years, Zuko," Ty Lee says sharply, crossing her arms. If the idea of what he has just suggested is not bad enough, it also sucks. "She'll know something's wrong in an instant."

"Maybe she won't trust you, but I don't think she'll turn you down. You're persuasive," Zuko says earnestly and Ty Lee _does_ know that this horrible, ill-thought out plan is way better than waiting to be dragged out of the forest and eaten.

Ty Lee gulps and again looks at the nearly sheer dress pressed against her tan skin.

If only they weren't so _scattered_. With all transport shut down for fear of dragon attacks, people remain quarantined and with curfews, and that makes it nearly impossible to reach the rest of their friends. If they had the Kyoshi Warriors, Zuko's super powerful friends like Toph and Katara, and the White Lotus, they could storm Caldera and have a decent chance of winning it back.

But the Spirits were not meant to be fucked with by the Fire Nation. _Why_ exactly they didn't ask Aang to help them, or maybe someone from the _Water Tribes_ ─ Sokka's ex-girlfriend is the Moon Spirit, right? ─ it would make more sense. But _Azula_? _Azula_?

If Ty Lee lives through Zuko's awful plan, she wants some of what the Spirits are smoking.

And as Ty Lee applies a swatch of lipstick, she decides that she _can_ provide the best kind of subtle. She licks her lips gently, remembering her guilt and pain, and how it immediately became bitter in her mouth after Azula returned and this all began.

It spiraled from a strange occurrence into an atrocity, and Ty Lee stood by and watched it. They all did.

Maybe Ty Lee _is_ the only one who has a chance with Azula. Their feelings never quite... died. Ty Lee has never met a person who _wouldn't_ sleep with her, and she knows how Azula works after so many years living in fear of her.

"I'll do it," says Ty Lee.

She will seduce and assassinate the Dragon Queen.


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter One**

* * *

Azula's father used to tell her stories about the _dragons_. She always asked to hear about them, always asked to hear about the legends of the royal family's status as deities; they were born from dragons, and Azula hoped so much that it was true. That they used dragons for conquest, because it was so much more desirable than the idea of machines and grunt soldiers.

But she was a foolish little girl who learned with age how to be cold, jaded and clinical in her actions, and never _hope_. Hope is always a mistake. _Always_.

Furthermore than just Ozai's bedtime stories to his daughter, the Fire Nation history books claim that the world was made from dragon's fire.

That is, of course, a quite dubious claim, since the Earth Kingdom history books proclaim badgermoles carved the continents, and humans were crafted from rock and clay. Or perhaps that the Water Tribes tell stories about Tui and La, and how they bestowed the gift of life and water to humans who lost their tails and rose from the sea.

Perhaps the only thing that legitimized the ravings of the Fire Nation is that their dragons are a force to be reckoned with. The ability to burn down entire forests, to eat towns alive, it showed the inherent superiority of fire. Sozin was a fool to have them hunted down, when they had been used for intimidation in the past, a living, breathing, invincible symbol of what the Fire Nation stands for.

The only reason _why_ Azula is thinking about dragons, is because she has been hallucinating them bursting from her body, coating her in blood and burning her, ripping at her skin with their scales. She is now pinned against a tree sinking down and burying her face between her knees, squeezing her eyes shut in hopes that it will bring her back to reality.

Something rustles behind her and she knows that it is whatever beast that has been stalking her throughout this entire forsaken forest. Azula has put herself into the mind of _surviving_ , and that has helped keep her head clear, but now she thinks she is too tired, too dizzy and too plagued with the dragons and gushing wounds to keep running from whatever the stalking shadow is.

She surrenders, even though Azula cannot bear to do that most of the time. _Surrendering_ is impossible for her; she has fought until the very end. And she had intended to keep fighting. Fighting Zuko, fighting doctors, fighting _everyone_ until she could no longer draw breath. But now... now she thinks she has at last truly broken beyond repair.

And no one will find her here, for better or for worse. Her skeleton will wind up between these trees for the rest of eternity, most likely. The thought of her decaying corpse makes her choke and gag on the contents of her stomach before she manages to breathe in deeply and control herself.

Maybe it does not feel so bad to cave in.

She feels her body become both cold and warm, as her fuzzy head drifts far away.

 **###**

Azula wakes gasping, and is unsure how she is breathing if she is dead. At first she feels suffocation, the tightening of her throat as she tries to push herself onto her knees, but finds her body uncooperative.

Her golden eyes flicker around, trying to figure out where she is. It is certainly not the canopies of trees that cast shadows over her dying body. It is cold, red and black, built of stone, reminding Azula vaguely of dull, boring ruins she was forced to visit for history classes in school. But she has certainly never been here before.

The cold floor feels like the softest pillow Azula has ever been on, but perhaps that is just because her body is so numb. She squints, and sees someone lingering, a shadow that she cannot describe. She tries to call out, to dare them to show their face, but she cannot.

Lips moving, yet no sound coming out sends her heart into a rapid panic. All Azula has is her clever words, when it comes down to it. Losing her speech has always been her greatest fear, and the most enraging thing to her is not being heard or listened to.

And now her terror is rising. _Please be more hallucinations, please be more hallucinations, please be more hallucinations..._

She hears feet clicking on the cold stone, and, at last, someone is standing above her. Azula's lips are ajar, her breath faint, as she genuinely cannot describe the figure.

 _Spirit_ , comes to Azula's mind. She probably should have taken this into account after getting lost in a known entrance to the Spirit World. Perhaps that explains her loss of voice, or the numbness in her body. The fact that she feels heated but cannot sweat or express it.

The shadowy figure does not speak, but moves away again after examining her for a moment.

Azula tries to calm herself and look for a means to escape. There has to be something, some way to make it out alive. Unless she is already dead... Is this the afterlife? Is this what it feels like to be erased from the Earth.

That thought wounds. Azula cannot bear the thought of being forgotten. She cannot stand the idea of being a footnote in history scrolls. She wanted them _all_ to remember her name. She exhales slowly and squeezes her eyes shut.

"You're crying," says a voice after Azula is long into a fit of silent tears. It is not easy to pin as male or female, old or young, _human or beast_. But it certainly is coming from the shadow that has been uneasily watching over her. "Get up."

Azula narrows her eyes, her lip curling into a snarl. But then the limitless invisible bonds seem to be lifted, and she forces herself to stand. She then tries to speak, but there is still nothing. It is still futile, and she hides her fear with a clenched jaw.

"There is someone very important for you to meet," says the formless and blurry shadow. "Come quickly, because there are enemies looking for you."

While Azula is not going to trust a _shadow_ while she cannot trust people she has known since her toddler years, she does not doubt that there are enemies.

There is always someone who wants Azula dead.

 **###**

Politics can make strange things happen in personal relationships. They can make allies from enemies, lovers from acquaintances, and a lot of messes that no one knows how to clean up. Zuko is currently rubbing his temples as Ty Lee paces incessantly in front of him.

He wants to ask her to stop, but he has to admit she is taking it better than he thought she would.

"It's not your fault." And then Zuko hesitates. "It's my fault, pretty much entirely. You had nothing to do with any of this."

Ty Lee's fingers twitch for reasons Zuko is unsure of, as her face contorts into varying levels of anger. "It's my fault she wound up this way in the first place."

"That's ridiculous," Zuko says earnestly, with a little too much passion in his voice.

"No, it's not. She would be fine if it wasn't for me. I shouldn't have ever come here, because then I wouldn't have to look my... what I did... in her eyes... _her eyes_..." Ty Lee drifts off slightly before rapidly shaking her head and keeping herself focused on the Fire Lord. He looks defeated too, his eyes puffy and purplish. Maybe Ty Lee should stop being so selfish.

"I spent so much time with my anger placed on the wrong people and the wrong things. And I blamed myself for a lot of things that I shouldn't have. It was bad for me." Zuko swallows as Ty Lee scowls at him, looking disgusted by his attempt at helping her. "I blamed myself too, but I had to stop. That's no way to live."

"If you hadn't ─ If I hadn't ─ _If_..." Ty Lee yanks her hair out of her face, making Zuko wince, while she does not show any signs of pain. "She's dead, isn't she?"

"That's too presumptuous." But Zuko's voice quavers slightly. Ty Lee closes her eyes and breathes in and out slowly.

 _Maybe she is better off..._

 _No, don't think that way..._

 _You knew she was never coming back regardless..._

Ty Lee composes herself and examines Zuko. "I need to leave. This place is horrible and dusty and really ugly and... reminds me of how ugly I am inside."

She turns on her heel and leaves just as Zuko opens his mouth to protest.

The Fire Lord frowns, wondering if there is anything he can do. That seems to be all he thinks about at this point.

Why, even though he constantly tries to do the right thing, he sometimes fucks up so badly.

It almost makes things seem futile.

 **###**

Meanwhile, in the Spirit World, Azula is ushered into a strange room, glancing between a variety of people she does not recognize. Most of them are somewhat monstrous, yet close enough to human forms to make them recognizable as her kind.

She does not think she has ever been so scared in her life. The _helplessness_ she feels is something she has never encountered before. Even in the darkest depths of her illness, she did not feel helpless. Because she _is not_ helpless.

But now, Azula is at the mercy of monsters. And not the type that she is.

With a swallow, she looks around.

"No greeting for the council?" asks the first shadow, and Azula is unnerved by how those seated in front of her do not move. She is forced into a chair, and remains there, not stupid enough to move. "Not being able to speak is really no excuse for rude behavior. Weren't you trained to be a princess?" demands the shadow and Azula leans back slowly, removing herself from a power position. She realizes that her best chance now is to play weak and compliant.

Azula for a moment thinks she might be on _trial_. Again, thoughts of the afterlife spring into her mind. Then thoughts of being drugged into hallucinations and silence, while she is actually before her enemies. Perhaps she is on the verge of death, and her subconscious is fighting and tearing at her, judging the fact that she has let herself lose.

She did not fully believe in the Spirit World until what she saw recently.

And maybe she still does not.

"Her gifts were so wasted," says a voice that Azula tries desperately to identify. But she can swear that the lips of no one on the _council_ moved. "So wasted. Perhaps she needs a second chance."

Someone scoffs and Azula still has no idea where the voices are coming from. She tries not to show her panic, not to show fear. She is so much better than that.

"It would be as much of a waste. Her potential clearly was misleading, and a mistake was made," insists the new voice and Azula shakes her head, despite wanting to scream that she has the _potential to bring down the walls of Ba Sing Se and how dare they presume that because she sleepwalks and hallucinates and has panic attacks means she is any less of a deity!_

"Her brother is just as good of a leader."

"He has not done anything to regain the importance of _tradition_. He may have made efforts and alliances, but the Fire Nation has still lost its way just as much as it did when Sozin erased its past."

"She is not the answer to that."

Again, Azula shakes her head, but she does not think they even _see her_ at this point.

"The world has forgotten more things than just old traditions. How many people even live in the mortal world who remember a time before?"

There is a chatter of speech that Azula cannot make out, and she does not know what is happening. She cannot quite comprehend what they mean by _old traditions_. Of course Zuko obliterated those, because he wanted the Fire Nation to be the _pet_ of everyone else. Their traditions are built on strength, machismo and the will to dominate.

Whatever these... _things_ are talking about does not sound much like that.

One, louder, clearer voice clears his throat. "Keep her locked up until we can test the potential we deemed upon her conception."

 _Upon her conception?_ If Azula were not on the verge of vomiting all over herself, she would find that laughable. Destiny is not real, and spirits are not known to intervene in mortal affairs.

Azula closes her eyes as she suddenly feels a thousand needles driving into her skin, and when she wakes, she is in a cold, dark box. She gasps, and gasps, and gasps and tries to distinguish if this is reality or not.

But Azula has not been able to tell the difference between reality and fantasy in a long time.

She does not let herself cry again. She will _not_ show weakness, not even for a second.

Their words about potential confuse her. Azula's father and grandfather told her that she had the potential to claim the world in her fist, which she _almost_ fulfilled if it were not for misfortune. She had the potential to be the greatest firebender in history, and so she bent lightning before she started puberty and could bend so fiercely and brightly that her flames were blue.

Azula's potential was _stolen_ from her by her _brother_ and his friends.

Whatever they speak of is clearly misguided and foolish, and Azula refuses to relent to her captors, even if they are not human. She does not look for a way out of her prison now, feeling too exhausted to try. She wonders how long it has been since she was dying against that tree, imagining dragons ripping her to shreds from the inside out.

Potential, potential, pointless...

 _Pointless_.

Maybe Azula does not care what her trial here decides, because she now remembers her last thoughts... that she had no reason to go on anymore.

She could not take the pain, and she could not bear anyone seeing how weak she was.

Her eyes gently close, and she fades away yet again.

 _ **###**_

Azula is taken from her cell as she is waking and it feels oh so familiar.

She is again struck with that sickening feeling that she could be _imagining_ this all. What if this is a trial before the Earth Kingdom and she just doesn't _know_? Even more troubling to her thoughts is the idea that she might not even have been drugged. She might have just at last completely, irreversibly lost her mind.

"The Council has been in talks," says the shadow leading her, the same one that guided her before. She wonders if there is a way to fight it, but she does not even know what the figure _is_. "They have decided that you are to be tested and, if you pass the test, they will release you from the Spirit World into the Fire Nation once more. If you fail, well, I'll let them explain."

 _What if I don't want to take your test?_ Azula attempts to say before realizing she cannot even make a sound. This is probably the most horrifying thing she has ever endured, and that is saying something.

She is seated, yet again, in front of the same, distorted, horrific, grotesque council.

"Do you remember the first test of character you were given?" inquires a disembodied judge that does not seem to remember that Azula has no voice. "When asked your reasoning, you blamed only your mother."

Azula just shrugs. Even if she could speak, she would say nothing. When doctors prodded her to discuss her mother, she would remain silent. And Azula would _certainly_ not be in this horrible Spirit World prison if it were not for her _mother_. That is an actual _fact_ , and not just her angered justifications as a confused young girl.

Another judge says, "Your test is very simple. You are to go to the Volcano across from this fortress. Inside you will find the very last of the dragons. Your family and nobles were very glad to wipe out the existence of an entire race. Didn't Sozin say something about them being an invasive threat to their masters? That they could not be trusted and would destroy you?"

That is true, but Azula is certain it is rhetorical. She always knew Sozin was wrong, just like she knew he was an idiot to wipe out the airbenders. Then Azulon, the equal fool, decided to try to finish the job wiping out the Water Tribe. What then? What then? It was not the most efficient way to do _anything_.

The genocide of the dragons was even more ridiculous.

"You may speak," says another warbled voice of a judge and Azula lifts an eyebrow before clearing her throat. It makes sound, thankfully.

"I think that the idea of wiping out an entire race is absurd, and was a horrible mistake. And I also think that most of it was just to cover up the fact that my father and his father and his father were obsessed with the idea of erasing the Fire Nation's culture and replacing it with their ideal. The dragons were overkill." And no one says anything. "I also think that my brother has only continued erasing the Fire Nation's history, just in another way that is more accepted by the other nations."

"Spirits do not claim one element," says one voice. "Even Tui and La, or Agni. But we do lament the loss of the gift we bestowed that three generations failed to uphold."

Azula shakes her head. "I don't know much outside of what I was allowed to be taught. I am clever, and I do want to _know_ things. But I was deeply limited by my father and his desires."

They murmurs among themselves as Azula tries to contain her fidgeting and fluttering heart.

"You are to prove your strength and use to us by killing the dragon you will find there."

"I..." Azula wants to protest, but she also is not sure if she should.

"You will go now."

 _ **###**_

Azula hits the dirt and has no idea how it happened. _Fuck you, Spirit World!_ is the only recurring thought in her head as she tries not to visible nurse her newfound scrapes and bruises. So the Spirits want brute strength?

She looks ahead of her and can feel stinging from heat in her eyes before she sees the volcano in front of her. Within is a dragon, and Azula will slay it.

If _Iroh_ can do it, she certainly can. But... "How am I supposed to fight anything without any bending or weapons?" Azula shouts at the air as she turns in circles.

And then something heavy appears in her palm. _Fuck you, Spirit_ World. It is a dagger, ornate and ceremonial. Azula thinks she may have seen similar ones somewhere before, but that is in the back of her mind.

She silently tucks the dagger she was given into her bra and starts walking towards the volcano jutting up into the dark, papery sky in front of her.

Azula can feel the volcanic ash whipping through her hair and stinging her eyes. She can remember once, when she was on Ember Island as a young girl, and her mother took she and her brother to see the sand dunes. They were famous and tall, stretching, reaching for the sky.

The sand was pitch black and incredibly sharp, like tiny daggers born of fire. And the dunes blocked out the sky like an eclipse, as the wind blew up the sand and made something of a small sandstorm with every forceful gust. It was impossible to breathe as she climbed them, and she dug her hands in and ran to the top, just to beat her brother in the race.

That memory brings a small twitch of a smile to her lips before she realizes what she is doing. She shakes her head, trying to rid herself of any distractions and get inside of this volcano as quickly as possible.

Azula starts running, as soon as she can will her limbs to do that. She is still in the Spirit World, and it is impossible for her to bend, which makes her heart pound. Fear is palpable, she _knows_ she can get hurt if her sore limbs and scratches are not imagined, but she cannot do the one thing she is good at.

The worst thing for Azula is that which she does best. She again pushes those thoughts away as she finally reaches the entrance to whatever this temple is. The ruins are visible in better detail as she gets closer, and she wonders if it is some remnant of a lost and forgotten part of the Fire Nation, or this is just what the Spirit World looks like.

Inside of the volcano, it is hotter and the suffocation more evident. Azula's worst fear is having her breath stolen from her, or her voice, or her freedom. . . _or her bending_. It is almost as if this Spirit World journey is engineered specifically to terrify and traumatize her.

 _Maybe her father thought of it_. Azula laughs quietly without thinking and then has to force herself to focus again.

In front of her is a long, rickety wooden bridge. The copious streams of orange magma are moving languidly, but Azula is certain that they will likely not remain that way for long. She does not trust that this task will be _very easy_.

She looks around for some other way, comes up short, and decides to run across the bridge as quickly as she can. Perhaps not the _brightest_ of Azula's plans, but _still_ , she is pretty desperate at this point.

After a lot of jumping, hopping, grabbing onto searing hot rocks and hoping she will not die, Azula manages to make it to the center of this stupid puzzle of platforms and pathways.

There is a hill, leading to a very evident nest. Azula can see a reptilian creature sleeping in it, and that must be her prey.

Then there is a shadow, this one a distinctly feminine form, but still indistinguishable, like the rest. It blocks her view of the dragon, and she squints as she walks closer to it.

"Do you understand the power in creation?" asks the figure in front of her. Azula is getting awfully tired of being surrounded by indistinguishable shadows. This one has an extremely familiar voice, but the intonation is off-putting. "The power in being a mother, or even _growing a plant_? The ability to watch something grow, to bend it to your will, to impart yourself onto it..."

"What?" Azula asks softly, trying to walk forward and finding herself barricaded. _Fuck you, Spirit World_.

"There would be far less wars and senseless pain if people like you or your father or your grandfather or his father knew what it was like to carry a life inside of you, to realize the importance..."

Azula feels the sudden ability to move and tries to run up the hill to figure out why the voice is so familiar, but she is knocked backwards, screaming, grasping at the air to catch herself, attempting to bend before harshly realizing she cannot.

From the feminine, shadowy figure has burst the smooth form of a fiery red dragon, roaring, its fangs in front of her. She collides with the obsidian beneath her and gasps as the winds are knocked out of her.

The dragon pulls back as Azula rolls away. She is supposed to slit its throat. The princess fumbles around herself, coughing, for the dagger she was given. Stumbling to her feet, she watches the dragon flying away from her, and she chases it.

And then she sees something she cannot explain or fathom. She has walked out of the volcano, to somewhere even hotter. A burning, burning place, destroyed. The same dragon, now looking so _tender_ , and not trying to bite Azula in half.

It is curled around a man. Protection, Azula thinks. . .

She tightens her grip around the dagger, seeing quite clearly that she is definitely not running across an active volcanic surface. She turns around and tries to reenter the chamber she walked out of, and when she finds the door, she winds up in a very different room.

There it is. The baby dragon. Relief floods her as she walks to it, wiping the sweat from the handle of her knife. She stops and looks at it for a moment.

Her hand stays as it just looks at her. Looks at her and gently touches her wrist with its nose.

"Stop being cute. I have to kill you," Azula snarls, adjusting her grip again as if that will change things. It still looks at her. She makes the mistake of staring into its eyes and sees herself looking back at her, herself holding a dagger, about to. . . "All of you are dead," Azula notes. "All of you are dead and no one even cares."

It makes a vague _mewing_ sound. Azula stares at it for a moment.

"I'm not going to kill it." She throws the dagger down and realizes she has probably just sealed her fate for death or condemnation to that fog they showed her. But Azula is not going to live by doing this. She may not have moral qualms about anything, but she also. . . She just clears her throat and turns, looking for someone to listen. "I'm not going to kill it. And you all can go fuck yourselves, because I am a leader and I do not do ridiculous things like walk across rickety, decayed bridges over lava and kill baby dragons because some stupid _spirit council_ that aren't even brave or noble enough to show their _faces_ tell me to!"

And as Azula predicted, she feels a sharp pain, and her vision becomes fuzzy.

But, _"You have passed_ ," echoes in her head right before she loses consciousness.


	3. Chapter Two

**Chapter Two**

* * *

"Please don't leave," insists Zuko and Ty Lee jumps and flinches in fright. His voice came from the shadows, startling the girl quietly tiptoeing through the shadow streaked halls of the Fire Nation Royal Palace.

The sun is not even up yet, and she is trying to sneak out as quietly as she can. It reminds her of certain times she has snuck out of the palace before sunrise, which only makes her stomach twist further and more furiously.

"I already stayed longer than I should have," Ty Lee says quietly, her voice hoarse. She does not know why she opted to stay behind anyway; it is not as if any progress was _really_ going to be made.

"Have some tea... stay for a few more hours. Please. There aren't even any ships leaving until well after sunrise," Zuko says and Ty Lee examines him. It strikes her only then that he does not want to be alone, and his friends are long gone.

"I'll have some tea," Ty Lee agrees without hesitation. She always liked Zuko, ever since she was a kid. There isn't anyone Ty Lee _dislikes_ , actually, even those who have hurt her. But there is no doubt in her mind she _likes_ Zuko enough to at least have tea with him before escaping.

"Thank you," Zuko says honestly as he stands and walks towards the kitchens with Ty Lee.

They are expansive, spotlessly clean and currently deserted. Ty Lee wonders how lonely the palace must get when Zuko is not occupied with the multitude of issues that have arisen since the end of the One Hundred Year War. Ty Lee fights her urge to pity him, and watches him start making a pot of tea.

He is evidently making chamomile. Ty Lee thinks it will probably serve calming her nerves and stomach fairly well, so long as it does not make her fall asleep. She was, in her days at the circus, notorious for drinking sleepy time tea in the morning, which she credited to helping loosen her limbs and improve her performance.

"Why are you running?" Zuko asks uncomfortably, having the sudden revelation that he has never really _talked_ to Ty Lee. He has written her off for a long time in his life as Azula's lackey, but clearly she is not just that. Clearly she was _never_ just that.

"Why would I stay?" Ty Lee replies quietly as Zuko starts pouring the tea he made. It went fast; she wonders if Iroh taught him how to do it so efficiently. "There's nothing keeping me here at all. My family isn't worth sticking around for, and, oh... I..."

"It's fine," Zuko says, waving his hand as she exhales guiltily.

"I didn't mean to make it sound like you weren't worth..." Ty Lee grimaces and looks at her tea.

The cup is gorgeous, streaked with intricate gold designs against the warm white porcelain. Inside, the steaming tea is a very light yellow, with perhaps a touch of green ─ or maybe that is just the light ─ and it smells strongly of panicked nights, sore throats and days gone by.

Days _long_ gone by.

She thinks about her childhood, and how she thought she would have come so much further from where she is right now. About the people she loves that she decided it would be more convenient for her to abandon. It hurts a bit to think about. _More_ than a bit, actually.

"I know what you meant," Zuko says and Ty Lee just continues staring at her tea.

She does not remember why, or how, or when or where she exactly lost her way.

 _ **###**_

Azula wakes up coughing, her entire slim body convulsing from the force of her own lungs. Either blood or thick saliva combined with dark mud comes out and drips onto the back of her hand. She suddenly realizes she is no longer in the Spirit World; or at least it seems, and at least she hopes.

She suddenly recognizes where she is. This is the road leading towards the mountains in which there are a variety of resorts. She and Mai went to one together with... Ty Lee...

Azula shakes away that thought, knowing she cannot let herself slip up. The trial was terrifying, and, strangely enough, amongst the insane hallucinations was where Azula had her moment of _clarity_. There is more to life than letting herself waste away in an asylum or letting herself be turned into her brother's pet or charity case.

The princess is not sure _what_ exactly, but she is going to find out. She did not live through that nightmare for nothing. And so she slowly stands up, struggling to figure out her limbs again. Her body still feels strange and sore, as if she has just been locked in an inescapable box for hours.

She might as well have been locked in an inescapable box for hours, Azula supposes. As soon as she can manage, Azula starts walking, crossing the muddy, slippery roads with gravel crunching beneath her feet. Her skin is already glistening with sweat, but she cannot bring herself to care.

Something inside of her is propelling her to keep going, to make it to those mountains if it is the last thing she does. And it _might_ be the last thing she does with her strong nausea and the unshakable, irremovable taste of blood in her aching mouth.

All she does is keep walking.

And keep walking.

Keep walking.

Walking.

 _ **###**_

Azula hits the ground somewhere in the middle of nowhere long into her journey.

No one has even come by; not a single cart or rider or even stray pedestrian. She imagines it is because the _isolation_ of this location. The farmland is distant, the small towns in the opposite direction. All there is around here is a long stretch of dirt roads and patches of trees leading to volcanic spas and other resorts for the wealthy.

She does not know why she thought she would find someone to help her. Or why anyone would _want_ to help her. Or for that matter, why the Universe even cares about doing anything except making her life as utterly miserable and impossible as it can manage.

So, when she falls, she just lets herself fall. She coughs again, for the thousandth time, this time only saliva voiding from her mouth, and not the same blood and dirt she has been wiping all over her clothes. It sticks to her chin and she does not have the energy to wipe it away as her chest heaves and she stares at the setting sun.

Honestly, it seems kind of like the world is conspiring to kill her at this point. She survives an insane hallucination. . . or perhaps a deadly and terrifying reality, in the Spirit World, makes it out, and then finds herself dying in the wilderness for the second time.

While there seem to be no second chances for Princess Azula of the Fire Nation, there seems to be an incessant string of punches to the gut. _Born lucky_. Ha. Ha. Ha.

Azula turns to look over her shoulder, wondering if she should give up now or not. She cannot see anything nearby, not a single sign of the civilization she is trying to reach. This is such a joke. She passes their dumb test and then she wakes and is going to die and. . .

 _And Azula does not want to die anymore._

She wants out of this. She wants to survive this if she has to claw, cling and drag herself up this mountain with only her fingernails and bloody, chafed knees.

"I don't even..." she mutters to herself, looking around and then sighing and giving up. "I don't know..."

And then Azula sees another dragon. Agni, she wishes her subconscious was slightly more _inventive_. Dragons, so boring. She would take literally anything over these ridiculous dragon hallucinations. . .

This one does not fade, even when Azula wills it to. But when has she had control over her head since she relinquished it so long ago?

It is bluish, but not at the same time. Eerie, and out of place, not as vivid as Azula's usual set of repetitive unwanted fantasies. This one is fully grown and does not seem to be attempting attack, and Azula can see how the marigold light of the sunset seems to make it shimmer, and to go through it.

And then she realizes that it is the same dragon that flew at her and she saw dying. Save, now it is in her world.

"What do you want?" Azula asks as the eerie spirit dragon just stares at her expectantly. " _What_?"

Azula lies there as it stares her down. And then she is hit by images definitely not of her own making, or so she thinks.

A dragon is talking to her through images of burning villages and this forest and. . .

 _Avatar Roku?_

Fang gave Azula one image that stuck in her mind, as if it was supposed to be remembered or acted quickly upon. And Azula took note of it, as she made her way to the cave he showed her. Not that it would be remarkably easy to pick out a single cave in this gigantic waste of trees and hot springs.

But she climbs. And climbs. The spirit of a dragon stays with her, not leaving her side, and prompting her to continue with images of her past, of her pain, like fire beneath her feet to keep her moving. She feels tortured by her journey, but she does not stop for long.

And that pays off in the end, despite Azula's ragged and injured state.

Azula is at last at the cave. She has to pull herself up with her fingers bleeding from the small rocks that have dug into her skin. But she ignores the pain as she finally walks inside, feeling the cool, damp air pressing against her dry, hot skin. It feels like relief in more ways than one, and she feels refreshed after entering.

She turns back, searching for Fang, but he has left her yet again. That does not matter to Princess Azula, however, because she knows that no one is on her side anymore. Trusting anyone was a mistake altogether.

Clearing her throat and cracking her knuckles, Azula moves further into the cave. She has to light a fire in her palm once the sunlight pouring in through the entrance fades away, and Azula is left in the darkness. But the darkness is Azula's only friend; she likes it. She likes how it can consume her, _yet_ , how she has the power to light it up, and expose the shadows for what they really are.

There aren't many scary things in the dark when _you_ are the monster, after all.

Azula hears someone and ricochets to a stop, nearly falling over, down into the black shadows beneath her feet.

"Hello?" the princess rasps out, hoping it is not a hallucination. She truly wishes that she knew what was real or not in this world. Perhaps, the nagging thought remains, she is still trapped somewhere, waiting for real judgment and not that of cloaked spirits.

She waves the light around her, trying to get a decent look at the person. And her gaze rests on a formless shadow. More shadows; Azula is beginning to hate them.

"Are you sentient?" Azula asks as she pursues the shadow.

There is silence, in response. The shadow is in front of a crevice, one that is guarded by a stream of water that Azula can feel the heat radiating from. It is not the kind of river that even she would jump into.

"Hello? Some spirit dragon told me to come here," Azula says loudly to the shadow, and it does not stir. Until Azula shakes her head in frustration and turns to leave, then, it seems to change its mind.

"You must be the girl they talked about. The lost princess."

"I'm not lost. I've just been locked up a few times," Azula snaps before realizing she will probably regret rudeness. But given her current physical and mental state, she is in no mood for anything other than a night's rest and some decent tea.

"Does my form disturb you?" asks the shadow and Azula shrugs. _Yes_. "Is this better?" And her shape is gone, replaced by Azula's mother.

That nearly sends the princess tumbling into the broiling hot geothermic river. "Not better! Of course not better!"

"This, then?" Father.

"No."

The shadow hesitates and transforms into an unknown person. An attractive woman, yes, but not one that Azula has ever met. The princess's heart does stop pounding.

"You're the girl they told me about. The one who I am supposed to train. The one who is supposed to be able to solve our problem." The young steps across the water, her feet landing with perfect timing on the stones that Azula did not even see through the steam.

She or it, or whatever creature Azula is dealing with, must have lived in this cave for a very long time. Azula, in her youth, would be very doubtful of this entire situation. But after what she saw in the quest for her mother, she is willing to believe in things she once would have called impossible.

"Who are you?" Azula asks as the woman waves for her to follow deeper into the cave.

"I've actually forgotten." The woman laughs too loudly and for too long. Then she coughs. "Regardless of who I am, it's what I _have_ that's important."

Azula is about to ask what she _has_ when her questioned is answered by a room opening up in front of her. At first it looks like just another stone box, but then she begins to realize that it is an eerie palace of sorts. If she is hallucinating this, someone ought to just lobotomize her and get this nonsense _over with_.

"What does this have to do with dragons?" Azula asks bluntly as she allows herself to be led up a spiraling staircase and to an elaborate bedroom that takes up the entire top floor. The bed is so tempting, as is everything here.

"I will tell you as soon as you bathe and sleep. You smell awful," says the unfamiliar woman and Azula shrugs. "The hot springs make for quite pleasant baths, so long as you avoid any eruptions."

She winks, with her strange, black eyes, and Azula starts to undress regardless of being stared at. The bath does feel magnificent. It reddens her skin as she sinks deeper into it, and can feel the fire flowing through her veins. She is one with the volcano.

Some people say that the volcanoes began firebending. Most people say that it was the dragons. Or perhaps the sun; the sun is the most commonly agreed upon interpretation, once dragons were proven to be able to be defeated.

Azula's mind naturally wanders as she fumbles through the assortment of handmade soaps. She has visions of the dragons of old and how they could destroy cities. How they seemed impervious to everyone. And how Sozin decided that they should all be killed.

She manages to remove herself from the water, even though she could stay for a thousand years. They tried to make her comfortable in the asylum; Zuko clearly asked them to treat her like royalty. But that just made it more patronizing, more sickening and undignified. He knows nothing of honor.

In fact, Fire Lord Zuko knows nothing.

Azula wraps herself in the robe left out for her on the bed, and falls asleep as soon as her head and back hit the soft, inviting mattress and pillows.

She wakes to something licking her leg. That makes her eyes widen in fear and shock, as she moves to whip it off of her, but she finds herself trapped. Sleep paralysis. Azula has lived through it a thousand times before, and she either imagined demons or her father. Which was worse, Azula still has no idea.

But what rises from her legs is a woman Azula knows in her heart that she never wants to see again. Never wants to see again, but there she is, half dressed and stunning, with her nimble fingers sliding up the hem of Azula's robe, stroking the inside of her thigh.

Azula cannot move, nor does she want to move. The progression is beautiful, enough to make Azula forget the acidic taste of betrayal, and how it is the only thing she can palate when she thinks about Ty Lee anymore. Then Azula is woken in shock when Ty Lee rises, looking up at Azula's melodic moans, and her eyes are pitch black.

Not real. Of course she was not real.

Azula wakes with her legs wrapped around one of the pillows, and she removes herself from her bed in shame. At least she feels rested for the first time in years...

"Fire Princess, are you ready to see your destiny?" asks the shadow, and Azula looks up to see that she is no longer the innocent stranger who she took the form of. She is Mai.

 _At least not Ty Lee. At least not Ty Lee after that dream..._

Or, Azula realizes in horror, maybe, given the black eyes, it was not a dream at all.


	4. Chapter Three

**Chapter Three**

* * *

Meditation. Azula was not told that this Spirit Destiny would require so much _meditation_. She is decent at it, and had often used the practices to calm her mind when she was very worked up or caught in ideas that would not leave her. The curse of superior intelligence. It also helped her control her bending, helped her conquer lightning.

But helping her conquer the world with magic Spirit World dragons and weird black-eyed women, _that_ is not so plausible.

"Shouldn't I be fighting or something?" Azula asks, confused.

"You will be," says the spirit.

Azula closes her eyes and focuses her hearing on the babbling of the geothermal rivers that course through the palace hidden in the cave. Slowly, she drifts away as her mind becomes numb. She holds a ball of cerulean fire between her palms, the most calming thing she can manage. It helps her focus, while releasing. It helps her live in the moment as she keeps a flame alive.

Then she is subjected to a particularly harsh dream.

She is surrounded by beasts all wearing the faces of people who betrayed her.

"Now fight!" shouts a voice, and Azula's jaw drops.

This, this cannot be happening.

Azula fights, because it is something that she knows how to do, no matter what happens. Her bending works, at least, although it did not in the Spirit World. She spins with the cerulean flame bursting from her like an exploding star in the middle of the shadows.

The masked creatures look like everyone who has hurt Azula before, but she knows, she truly knows that nothing and no one can hurt her anymore.

Her mind wanders as she gathers fire and the power of storms, as she remembers these people and how she thought her little group of friends would last until the end. How she thought that she would never fall from her pedestal, because Azula was destined for greatness.

But here she is, spitting blood after a sudden blow from a fuzzy enemy that she is unsure how to defeat. She gasps for breath and slides down to avoid the dark shadows coming at her, like the shadows are being bent.

Azula looks for another way out. This cannot be as simple as fighting hard and using her naturally gifted skills of bending. She runs forward and finds a metal door knocker. Azula grabs it and pries the wall in front of her away as if it were paper.

Yes, this place is strange, this place is very, very strange.

She is pursued by the creatures, but she pushes forward without a second thought. In front of her are more and more hazy hallways, and suddenly Azula realizes that there is no escape and she needs to stop looking for one before she loses her mind.

She is _in her mind_ , Azula suddenly realizes, and she feels incredibly perturbed by that thought.

 _"Just work piece by piece,"_ echoes the spirit's voice and Azula feels a slight shiver as she remembers how much she wanted the sleep with her even though she knew that she was an eerie ghost wearing a disguise. Maybe the disguise would be enough, for Azula to remember, just for a moment, just for a little while.

Azula walks to the first door that becomes clear to her and can see a maze ahead of her. So be it, if this is how she is going to live.

Her eyes closed, she takes in a deep rattling breath, and pushes forward to fight for whatever it is the spirits want from her.

 _ **###**_

The battles become very easy once Azula gets used to them. She discovers that she truly, genuinely enjoys having this _power_ that was stolen from her when she lost her mind, her throne and her freedom. Her Spirit Mentor has taken on the much less disconcerting form of Mai, even though Azula still can feel the snarl on her lips and angry fire when she sees her. But Azula knows that the sight of an enemy, the idea of it in the back of her mind, is more of an incentive than anything else could be.

Azula has always known that the very best things are done out of spite. Using your anger, hatred and desire to prove them _all wrong_ is the best way to become powerful beyond belief.

"I think you are ready to see why the council directed you to me," the visage of Mai says and Azula nods wordlessly.

She follows, even if she hates the idea of being led.

And the spirit speaks. "One hundred years of war does damage to more than just humans. It permanently damaged more than just your world, and the Avatar being gone has left a scar on balance that is difficult to heal. Your brother means well, but he is not what we need. There is good and bad, well, _no_ there's not good and bad but I am not at all in the mood to explain thousands of years of complex morality to you, and the spirits who you would call... _bad_ want a quick fix to their struggles."

"Those never work," Azula says honestly and the spirit shrugs.

"No, they don't. But you did just run directly into one of the only _four_ where the Spirit World blends with the Mortal World, and happen to have exactly what we're looking for in this war, so you were asking to get involved."

Azula opens her mouth to protest, but she has just been led to a tomb, or what looks like a tomb, deep in the volcano. She is not afraid of the magma as she follows her guide, gradually believing more and more in what is happening to her. This seems exactly like the kind of thing spirits would do.

She is led to a warm room, sweltering, even by Azula's standards as a prodigious firebender. Azula squints as she sees that it looks to be a trove of treasure, but there is not a trace of gold or precious gems. Only three eggs, in a row.

Princess Azula has seen them before. Fossilized dragon eggs in the homes of nobles who want to show off their wealth. Her lips twitch in a wistful smile as she remembers her hope as a child that one of her grandfather's collection would hatch one day, and latch on to Azula and love her and destroy her enemies.

"They say you can hatch them," says Mai, and Azula is unnerved by how _off_ her voice is. "If you put yourself through the right training first. Can you do that for me, Princess Azula?"

Azula walks forward, entranced by the eggs. They call to her like the Water Tribe sirens that drunken sailors would discuss as they told regaling tales of the navy. She touches one, only with the tip of her finger, and images surge through her mind like the ones Fang ruthlessly implanted.

Princess Azula is the Queen of the World. She reigns with dragons. The dragons are love, and they love her. _Mother, mother_...

Azula manages to pull away when she hears that word, twisting within her. Surely it must refer to Ursa somehow. Surely, no _creature_ would call Azula a mother. She may be a monster in the figurative sense, but not in the literal.

"Do you see your destiny? The Spirit World is in horrible turmoil, for the past century. There was so much hope that Fire Lord Zuko would help us, but he was not the leader we needed. Your fire tells the story we wanted to hear. _You_ are the one to bring back this side of the Fire Nation."

"I want nothing to do with the nation that betrayed me," Azula says coldly and the spirit in the body of Mai shrugs. But that is a lie. Azula still does have loyalty to her country, to her people. Even if she is disgraced.

And the idea of being powerful again is completely intoxicating and irresistible.

"It will take many steps. You must suffer but also relieve suffering. I will take you through the journey, and you will keep the eggs safe in your custody, until either they are ready to hatch, or you are proven unworthy," the spirit says and Azula knows that she has no choice but to accept.

She would rather reign over misery and squalor with the force of dragons, than serve Fire Lord Zuko.

"It's beautiful," Azula murmurs to herself.

"It will imprint on you, but it can't like this. You need to speak to Fire Lord Zuko, but he's useless."

" _Ha_. I _know_!"

"Shut up. You are to speak to Iroh about Ran and Shaw and the term _kuzet._ "

"Are those brands of tea?"

"They are very important, and you will see just why once you leave this dream."

"Wait - what?"

"You thought this was real?"

* * *

 _ **AN:** These are the rewrites, and now it's moving into the all new chapters I have written. Thanks for reading. _


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four**

* * *

After her exile among spirits ended, Azula dug herself by her fingernails out of a ditch in a destroyed town.

She was bloody. She seemed like a corpse.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee danced happily draped in gold at her wedding, and it was beautiful. That was one year ago, and she felt deep down that, on one hand, her old love was freshly burned and she was probably just trying to fill that gap with someone who had the same eyes. But on the other, she knew that she deserved happiness.

But, of course, stability was never something Ty Lee's life had offered her. And it is quickly upset in just one moment, due to one letter that her husband of one year receives.

 _ **###**_

It has been a long two years since Azula vanished from this world without a trace, and Zuko is straining his eyes in the dim candlelight as he goes through endless stacks of mail. There have been rumors of spirit attacks in the rural Fire Nation, as if the New Ozai Society were not bad enough.

They have been growing in intensity, even in other nations, and they make so little sense. Aang says that the spirits are friendly, and that he is going to get into contact as soon as he can.

But Zuko sometimes wonders if he woke something up when he went to get his mother, but Aang assures him otherwise. Still, Zuko is not certain that the Avatar always knows what he is talking about. No one did teach him how to properly be the bridge between worlds, at least yet.

Zuko sometimes believes in ghosts. He never stops thinking he killed her, and he often thinks she is haunting him.

It has been two long years since Zuko heard anything from Azula, until a letter that got mixed in with mundane work, reports and occasional bad news makes his head spin. He thinks he would have fainted if he were not so used to news that comes out of nowhere and punches him in the gut.

Zuko rises immediately, his back cracking with the sudden motion, but he feels no pain. He knows that he has to do _something_ about this mess, right?

It is a letter about Azula that has to be a joke. Because she is dead and Zuko has mourned her for so long, and has still not yet stopped suffering about it, even with his happy marriage and nearly stable life.

He still sometimes wakes up screaming about her, about _her_ and he struggles to explain that to the woman in bed next to him. They both have felt like her blood is permanently stained on their hands for two long years.

And now? Now a small infirmary at a resort for the eternally wealthy says that they have her, unconscious and in a poor state. Zuko originally plans on sneaking out, but he cannot bring himself to do it. Because she has to know, and Zuko knows that she has to know even though there is this dark, slithering creature of jealousy that knows she always loved Azula more than him.

He knocks gently on the door of her bedroom. She gets up, not bothering to cover anything exposed on her slender body.

"Ty Lee, there's..." Zuko inhales through his teeth and her heart skips a beat. "There's somewhere I'm going and you might want to come too."

"What happened?" Ty Lee inquires and Zuko frowns, wringing his hands uncomfortably.

"She's...my sister has showed up. She's hurt and her condition is...abnormal, but she won't say anything except to me..." He stops talking, because she is suddenly getting dressed without her normal, careful way of selecting the perfect outfit.

This is alarming.

"Call Mai," Ty Lee says through the shirt she has in her mouth. "If something is actually wrong or anybody has to make bad decisions, she's not got the emotions we have."

Zuko just nods.

 _ **###**_

Azula woke roughly six hours ago, for a fleeting few minutes, only to learn that she has been unconscious for two years. She was able to speak lucidly to the healers in this hospital, but they did not tell her much about her condition, except asking her questions. But Azula could only give a few vague memories of pain, and lights and winces as they checked her wounds.

She fell asleep again. Azula drifts between sleep and wakefulness as she overhears whispers of the healers now and then.

 _"She should be on a pyre, not sitting there answering our questions."_

 _"I don't know how she's alive, but she is."_

 _"I don't know how that child is alive. But maybe it isn't even a..."_

When Zuko arrives, however, the discomfort turns into warm smiles and friendly bows that make Azula want to scream and raze the place to ashes. She wants to burn a _lot of things_ to ashes, to be honest, and she likes the idea of conquering the world with dragons very much.

Azula is half asleep still, as she has been, when Zuko, Mai and Ty Lee arrive. She begins feeling more like the healers think she should be every day. Like a person who was suspended between life and death for two years.

Ty Lee nearly upchucks all over her nice shoes when she sees Azula. It is _definitely_ Azula, but at the same time, _not her_. Her hands are freshly cleaned, as is the rest of her body. Her hair is mostly combed, but certainly could use to be cut. The undersides of her nails are still stained with her own blood.

And her eyes are half open in her sleep, her breathing even, despite her cracked lips and pale, waxy skin.

She looks like a corpse somebody found decomposing in the woods. A sudden shock grabs Ty Lee and she chokes on the sensation in her throat. She remembers all of the horrifying, invented images that Ty Lee's mind tormented and taunted her with.

Of a corpse decomposing alone in the woods.

 _Agni_.

Zuko emerges from the small, well decorated office of the healer with a grave expression.

"It's more serious," he says quietly.

"More serious than _this_? Look at her! Look at that _husk_ of a person!" Ty Lee screams, not caring if the entire smug resort hears her shouting. Hears the future Fire Lady screaming like an enraged toddler.

"I'm awake, you know," Azula whispers and Ty Lee shrieks in fright. Zuko takes her in his arms and Mai's hand twitches towards a small flash of silver that Azula's eyes catch.

Azula extends her shaking hand, which is clean despite the light pink marks. It lingers there for a moment before Mai is the one to take it a help the princess up.

"Give me a mirror and tell me how the fuck I got here," Azula says, her lethargy beginning to pass.

She hears a healer whisper something about how the arrival of her _friends and family_ must have triggered her lucidity. More like the adrenaline of hatred and refusal to let them kidnap her or control her, but she will take what she can get.

Mai supports her silently as a healer adjusts a mirror, one takes her hair, which is overgrown, the other carefully making sure bandages do not get displaced.

After taking a few deep breaths, Azula gazes intently at herself and no one of those traitors seems very surprised at all. How they could not be in complete and utter shock at what Azula is seeing in front of her baffles the princess to the core. She touches her face before touching her abdomen.

No, this is not right. There is no way that in any world that this could possibly be right. She has a sudden vivid memory of the last thing she was doing before she woke up in the hospital. There was painful, blinding light as she finally jumped through the endless hoops of challenges and was able to hatch the egg of a dragon that, by all means, should not exist.

It looked at her. Just briefly. A glimpse of sapphire and golden eyes, before Azula reached out to touch it and then she could barely stifle the fire that she saw washing over her and leaving her breathless.

"I'm... knocked up," is all Azula can manage to say and they seem to be baffled that she is so unaware.

Maybe it was all a nightmare, maybe she was just trying to convince herself that she wasn't in this state. But Azula cannot imagine herself winding up like this. She has only ever wanted to bed women, and she just cannot...

Not that any of this other resurrecting dragons and helping spirits business was what she had planned for her life either, but pulling herself out of a ditch was one thing, and dragging herself towards the nearest civilization was another, and realizing how crazy she would sound was pretty bad, but finding out that this was what the freaky spirit was talking about was _another that she did not like at all._

That was the part about the distinctly disturbing _thing_ inside of her. Which she is calling a baby because really there is only _so much_ insanity a person can stomach.

She is trying not to be concerned about it, and focusing on how confused all of the healers are about her wounds. Unless this part is the dream. Azula hates the fact that she is never quite sure of what reality is. It pains her, but it _is_ real, even if she does not believe it.

"Well, I look fine," Azula says hoarsely and she looks at Mai, and that at her brother, and then to Ty Lee. They definitely do not believe her, but she thinks that it is _more_ incredulous that she _wouldn't_ know about looking this pregnant. "Now the _what the fuck happened to me_?"

"The doctors said that you got hurt in a spirit attack," Zuko explains, gesturing loosely at the direction of the workers at the small infirmary. "There have been a lot of them in the rural Fire Nation lately. I'm not sure why, honestly."

Azula parts her lips to tell him what she now knows about the spirits, her fate and their design, but she decides to be quiet. She does not have the dragons that she was promised, and she has no idea what she is supposed to do with ─ "I had a pendant!" Azula shouts and everyone briefly movies into a fighting stance. "Who stole it?"

She is reaching around her body, not even bothering to avoid the small bump pressing against the soft red blankets. Azula cannot find a single trace of it; the charm that Azula was told would come into play once she realized her destiny and at last achieved her dreams.

"It's right here," says a very nervous, young and sweaty healer. Azula looks at Ty Lee, and how the traitor is so unafraid to gaze at the shimmering jewel, but will not look at Azula at all costs. Well, Azula's thoughts have remained complicated during however long her exile amongst the spirits was; she does not care what Ty Lee looks at. "You had it wrapped really tightly around your arm when they found you."

The healer bows and walks away after Azula nearly rips her arm off taking back what is hers.

"They found me harmed by spirits?" Azula says softly, pushing herself up in the bed and reacting in discomfort to what must have happened while she was treading beyond this corporeal realm.

"Well, they found you after you dug your way out of a ditch outside of a town that got destroyed in one of the weird attacks. Are you okay and being treated well?"

"I am doing just swimmingly. I have never felt better in my entire life," Azula breathes through bared, angry teeth.

"Do you want to come home with us?" Zuko asks and Azula knows the question is really if she wants to come willingly or if they are going to have to restrain her. She looks at silently, statuesque Mai, Ty Lee gazing at the boring painting on the drab wall, and Zuko trying to look calm.

"No," Azula states coldly.

Zuko recoils. "Is there, uh, anything you need?"

"To speak with you alone," she says with severity and Zuko nods.

"No, I want to talk to you alone," Azula says softly, because she has so much that she needs to work out before she is at all capable of finding her promised army of dragons.

After a quick glance, Mai very reluctantly leaves, needing to take Ty Lee by the arm in order to get her out of the room. She still looks so queasy and stunned that Mai pities her awfully, but not as much as she does Zuko. Or Azula, for that matter.

Zuko waits until he is with Azula, rubbing his hands together slowly, nervously, hoping she is not about to start a fight. She does look reserved, but far from relaxed, and he has no idea if she intends to strike or not. With her, it usually is the former.

"I need to speak to Uncle," Azula rasps and Zuko furrows his brow.

"No ─ I, I mean _why_?" he says, taking a deep breath. "I don't know what you want from him. You usually avoid him and he's in Ba Sing Se."

"I need to talk to him about Ran and Shaw," Azula says softly, trying to lock eyes with Zuko, but he keeps averting his gaze like a coward. But then, the minute she says those two unfamiliar words that she does not know the meaning of, he looks up and their golden eyes meet. They lock.

"How do you know about them?" Zuko hisses, his tone harsh, looking like a _leader_. Azula kind of likes that he has forgotten that she is insane, sick, covered in sores, emaciated and knocked up with something she does not think is human.

"How do you?" Azula replies sweetly, because even if he _is_ Fire Lord and so much _wiser_ now, ZuZu is ZuZu.

"There is no way you know anything about the _last dragons_ ," Zuko growls and he sees the flash in her eyes.

"I didn't until you just told me," she whispers. "But I need to talk to him about them. And something called _kuzet_. And get me out of this hospital as fast as you can. I hate places like this."

Zuko very slowly stands up and backs away a little bit. He realizes losing footing in front of her is foolish, but it is too late now. His pulse is rushing, his vision is fuzzy and the living dead girl on the hospital bed has just turned his calm life upside down.

"I don't...I'll ask him for you."

 _ **###**_

Azula does not learn very much about the world at present as she journeys back to the palace. She has a headache, and body aches, and wounds. She is very preoccupied with the fact that there are apparently dragons _still alive_ , and the fact that she spoke of them means that her dream was not just a dream.

The Spirit World _is_ the only explanation for her being alive right now, in the first place.

Princess Azula learns only two things upon her return to the palace. Ty Lee has married Zuko and become Fire Lady, and there are unexplained spirit attacks that the Avatar is currently investigating.

And when they arrive, Iroh is already waiting, having received his nephew's letter.

There are many intriguing possibilities as of now.


	6. Chapter Five

Iroh gives a tentative welcome to Azula.

The observation that she looks like a corpse is not a new one, and it is a very true one. Iroh swallows uncomfortably, his throat tight. The shadows of the palace make her look even more eerie, and make the changes to her seem more supernatural and ghastly.

She is not that little girl. Far, far from it.

"It is wonderful to see you," he says kindly, but Azula does not believe him.

She can feel the ice cold chill from everyone around her. It is not quite _hatred_ , as Azula feels for them, but they are disturbed by her. Perhaps her condition, perhaps her existence, perhaps the fact that they have to live with her and even acknowledge that she is, indeed, a person.

Or maybe that they have to acknowledge that she is far less of a person than she used to be. And that is not just because she is somehow not only alive, to the stunned whispers of the healers, but has something potentially alive within her, and because she is still crazy and if she breathes a word of why she knows she clawed herself out of that grave like she just fell firebending and scraped her knees they will have her locked up again.

Even after all they have seen, she knows. They probably are already debating when the appropriate time will be to send her back, and Azula feels more and more like the healers expected her to as days go by. Spirits are cruel and deserved what they got, whether they want her to be the hero of their war or not.

"... I took the liberty of making tea," Iroh says as Azula tunes back into the conversation.

"Of course you did," Azula whispers, and she looks up.

She glances around the room and tries to catch the gaze of the people who now have her fate in their hands. Ty Lee is still pretending that her hands and the ceiling are _incredibly_ interesting, Zuko is looking very gravely in front of him, and Mai averts her eyes when caught staring. Iroh, however, either tactlessly or politely meets Azula's gaze.

Tea time, Azula supposes.

 _ **###**_

Zuko does not waste much time before listing all of the delightful rules and restrictions. Azula just stares into her tea and tries to keep from falling asleep and drowning in it.

Azula has barely sat down at the table in the sunny room with too many windows, when he already begins asserting his law. She does not care about it, not anymore, but the onlookers seem entertained.

"I want you to have a psychological exam, a physical one, uh, one about, uh, you know, that," Zuko says, counting on just one finger as if he has forgotten he is supposed to use multiple ones. "And you need to obviously be escorted everywhere by soldiers, at least one trusted member of the family or friend of the family. The Avatar will be here by tomorrow afternoon to help decide what we should do."

"Mmmhm." Azula still stares into the teacup.

He clearly expected more resistance.

"You have the appointments tomorrow. I don't have anything of intense importance, so I will take you personally." He rubs his neck. Zuko heard this so fiercely in his head, in the way he had to learn how to speak, thanks to father deciding that one kid learning was good enough. But she trips him up. "And then Aang, right?"

"I want to talk to Uncle alone," Azula says crisply and Zuko takes a deep breath through his dry mouth. "I have no idea why that concerns you. It isn't a very demanding request. I'll do your ridiculous appointments."

It concerns him because there is no reason for Azula to know about the Sun Warriors and the last dragons. While Iroh can fend for himself, and while Zuko trusts him, the Fire Lord is more than reluctant to take his eyes off of her. He did not trust Azula in the first place, but he trusts this resurrected version of her even less.

"Zuko, please," Iroh says and the Fire Lord rubs his eyes.

"Okay. Five minutes." _That_ he says with conviction, not that his sister seems to care.

The others, who had been silently watching, slowly drift out of the room as Azula tries to remain as patient as possible. Azula looks away from her tea and licks her metallic flavored chapped lips. Iroh waits with his fingers clasped and set on the table.

"I have a headache and no time for pleasantries," Azula states and Iroh does not protest; he just continues to look at her. "I need to talk to you about Ran and Shaw, and something called a _kuzet_."

"You know what none of those things are," Iroh says placidly, with no derision or anger.

"You're smarter than Zuko," Azula says softly as she rolls her sore shoulders. "He told me about the last dragons when he fell for a trick most people can spot by age seven. But, no, I have no idea why I am supposed to talk to you about this."

"Yes, you do."

"Stop pretending to be a mind reader. No one is amused or impressed."

"I am not being a mind reader. I am saying the things that you do not want to say aloud so that you can express them to me and make this conversation take place in five minutes."

Azula clenches her jaw. "I had some Spirit World journey, and they put me on trial and I went to a place and learned things and fought things and was told about dragons and some spirit disagreement and then I was told to ask you about those things and I woke up dragging myself out of a mass grave in a town that had been attacked by spirits."

Iroh did not expect her to be so honest, or to say so much so quickly. And so he is blunt and honest as well. "I believe you."

"Figures." Azula shrugs. "Not that you've done much to help the spirits. I haven't either, to be honest."

He looks at her _knowingly_ and she wants to burn his face off.

But before she can satiate that desire, her time is up far too quickly.

 _ **###**_

The psychological exam goes as well as expected. Azula is cold, detached and certainly does not have the best results, but it is enough to keep Zuko abetted for a little while longer. And Princess Azula needs only a little while longer.

"You participated in that," Zuko suggests and Azula turns away. "It was good. Thank you."

She gives him nothing.

 _ **###**_

It is the physical exam that interests Azula.

Zuko has the best of the best to look her over, and she pays careful attention to every motion. The healer's eyes often widen, his neck tenses frequently, and he altogether seems even _more_ alarmed than the inexperienced healers.

"You are..." The healer licks his lower lip nervously. "You are mostly healthy. Of course, you need to regain some strength and the bruises on your skin are a little abnormal. The... pregnancy would not be abnormal if not for the circumstances."

That much is evident.

The circumstances are about as abnormal as it gets.

He tells she and Zuko a few things about her health, a few herbal concoctions that Azula does not care about. She looks at the bruises on her skin, touches the small bump near her hips that she tries to ignore. The answers are not here in Caldera, in this cold healer's office. They are wherever Ran and Shaw and _kuzet_ are.

And Azula is going to get there if it kills her.

 _ **###**_

"You just looked at me," Azula says in mock surprise.

Ty Lee briefly glares. "I have been looking at you as much as I look at anybody else."

"Mhm. So are you bothered by the fact that I'm alive? Or are you scared of my body like most people? Scared of my head? Concerned that it's a bad idea to leave me unshackled?"

"Anyone would have those..."

"Or are you scared I'm going to wreck your darling marriage?"

Ty Lee looks away, and does not look at Azula again.

 ** _###_**

 _Azula wakes up suffocating._

 _She can smell blood and rot and ashes. She can feel things against her skin that she does not want to look at. She can tell that she is in more trouble than she was in the Spirit World._

 _Her first instinct is to punch upwards. Oh, that is human skin. That is a human arm. That is more than one human corpse. But she does not stop forcing her way upwards, lighting her hands and forcing herself not to gag over the smell of burning flesh._

 _She reaches the surface, which does not smell much better. At least she can breathe now. She makes one last push with her meager strength and ends up atop ashes._

 _It was a mass grave. It_ is _a mass grave. She turns and gazes at it while breathing raggedly. If she was in_ there _, she probably is not in the best of situations._

 _Her body screams at her that it does not want to move, but she does not have another choice. Azula makes herself stand and walk towards the dirt road. She is in a leveled village, but that doesn't matter to her._

 _She feels and looks like a zombie._

 _Some stupid peasant village doesn't matter._

 _ **###**_

Azula snaps back to reality when she hears her uncle.

"I want to help you," says Iroh.

"Everyone does," Azula bitterly replies.

She is lying down in a sun room. It's very serene and _alive_. Her head always echoes with what it felt like to claw her way out of a mass grave. That was certainly the least pleasant part of an unpleasant journey. Now she just tries to cope with the aftermath, as usual.

And her brother being married to her old girlfriend.

The one she still kind of likes.

And being knocked up with something that might not even be human.

The only evidence of her transcendental two-year trip.

"No. I want to break you out of this custody and take you to where I think the spirits want you to go," Iroh says and Azula's jaw drops.

She does not think her mouth has ever done that, but the last thing she would ever expect is an offer of aid from her uncle. Particularly assistance that goes against Zuko's wishes. Then again, she has no idea what she was asking for in their previous conversation; it could be something that gives him hope that it can turn her " _good"_ or whatever else he calls being a weakling.

"Okay, so last dragons and the word you refuse to define? Let's get going." Azula forces herself to stand up even though it hurts.

Turns out 'should have be dead' means 'will be in excruciating pain for an indefinite period of time' as Azula has learned the hard way. She learns everything the hard way.

"You should pack. We will be traveling through jungle after a lengthy ride. There is not another way to the ruins."

"Ruins? Why are we going to _ruins_?" Azula demands.

"You said you wanted to pursue the prompts that the spirits gave you. I am offering you only one chance."

"You're worse than my father sometimes. The _jolly_ and _grandfatherly_ exterior doesn't change that about you."

"Very observant." He doesn't want to give her the satisfaction of seeing him bothered. He also knows that she is going to make helping her extremely difficult for him.

Azula goes to find some of the few belongings that Zuko gave her.

 _ **###**_

"You try to push away those who help you because you are punishing yourself constantly."

"I'm punishing myself by being in an enclosed space with you for so long. Do you _ever_ stop giving unwanted advice?"

"I will stop once you take the unwanted advice."

"That is never happening." The sound of wheels rolling replaces Iroh's lecturing for a few blissful minutes. But then Azula screams, "What was that?"

Her uncle nearly falls out of the carriage from shock. "What was what? My hearing isn't that bad."

"It's inside of me. Something is trying to break through my ribs."

He stops himself from laughing, which is a challenge.

"It's a baby kicking," he says. "You _are_ – you _are_ having a child, you know."

"I'm probably having a monster. The healers said I should have been a corpse. How could I possibly be pregnant?" _I also certainly don't remember ever having sex with a man in my life,_ she thinks after saying it.

"Well, I will love that monster niece or nephew the same as any other," Iroh says and Azula forces herself to not argue. She needs him at least until she gets to these dragons.

The carriage comes to a lurching half at the edge of the forest. At first, Azula thinks she is at her final destination, but then she sees why they really stopped. She pushes open the door and gets out of the carriage as fast as she can move.

"What is that?" Azula demands with wide eyes.

"A spirit." Iroh shuts his carriage door. The driver and ostrich horses are all missing.

"It's in the trees," Azula whispers. She tries to follow the motions with her eyes, but it is too fast and well camouflaged to get a lock.

Iroh lights his hands and Azula does the same.

They might be in some serious trouble. Iroh follows it with his eyes and sees that it is not doing anything but examining the two royals. He narrows his eyes.

"Hit that tree," he orders Azula and she squints at him.

"I'm not angering it. I've heard about the spirit attacks." She was buried in a mass grave from one particularly devastating spirit attack.

"Just test it. Please," Iroh asks and Azula sighs.

She touches two fingers together and singes the bark of a tree near the spirit. It twitches, but does not attack.

"This feels wrong. We should leave," Azula says. This makes her very nervous.

"It may follow us," Iroh whispers, although he seems skeptical. His eyes flit around anxiously, which makes Azula feel nauseous.

"Are we supposed to fight this thing?" she shouts at Uncle and the old man shakes his head.

It just keeps _moving_ , looking like it wants to attack but doing nothing. Azula wonders if running will provoke it, or if running is the best thing she can do. It hasn't retaliated since she attacked it.

"Let's go into the jungle," Iroh says firmly and Azula nods twice.

She follows him as fast as she can.

 _ **###**_

Azula watches a sun bear prowl through the jungle.

It does not even come near her. Much like the spirit she saw. A _spirit in the mortal world_ , which means Zuko _does_ have his hands full and the Avatar is as _useless_ as Azula believed.

"I want to hunt that," Azula says and Iroh raises his eyebrows. "You have lost our bags and our driver. I want to hunt that sun bear."

"It looks…"

"Are you looking to drastically lose some weight? There are probably poison berries somewhere here I can gather for you."

Iroh says nothing about the fact that they just were run into the thick of the jungle by a _spirit_ of all things. She appreciates his restraint, because this is _all his fault_.

"We're close to where I want to take you, I am sure. Well, I think. I know it's about two days from the road and is near trees."

"Well, we're _near trees_ ," Azula snaps, but she is pretty sure they are less than two days from the road. He clearly is just trying to stop her from ripping his throat out. "I can't believe I even trusted you for a minute."

"I didn't think you trusted me. That is very sweet of—" he begins before she reaches out to burn him but he grabs her wrist before she even gets close.

"I am _going_ to hunt that. You make a fire and find somewhere for me to sit down because you have so happily pointed out that I am pregnant. And now fending for my life in the jungle looking for…?"

"Sun Warrior ruins. If you see any, let me know," Iroh says as if this is a _picnic_ in the park.

"Fine." Azula does not even bother asking him about what he wants from _Sun Warrior ruins_. She is in no mood for riddles. "I will be back."

She does not wind up coming back.

 _ **###**_

Because the ruins are not exactly deserted.

And now she is blindfolded. She fought before realizing that this might be worth investigating. But every second, she is more and more livid at Iroh. Azula is going to figure out this Sun Warrior nonsense, but she is never forgiving him.

Her uncle _could have_ warned her about this, but, of course, he does not trust her. Which nearly has gotten her killed. Maybe Azula should try to be more trustworthy. No. No, that sounds terrible. She never wants to do that.

Once people start making it possible to trust them, she will make it possible for people to trust her.

That is only fair.

 _ **###**_

Azula stares at her bonds and looks around at ruins that are not quite deserted. Chatter is about spirit attacks, as with most places. They seem to think that she is not listening.

She doubts that the Sun Warriors will let her go. Or at least the remaining ones. She knew they were extinct, but…

"There aren't enough of you to sustain even a village," Azula says as she glances around the ruins. "You've lost people to spirit attacks."

One of the four guards examines her. "We have. And you will help us by speaking to Ran and Shaw."

"Is that dangerous?" Azula asks, her fingers moving to break free of her bonds. There are so few of them, it would take a tiny bit of lightning to get out of here.

But, no, Ran and Shaw. Important. This is the closest she has gotten to answers.

The apparent Sun Warrior says, "We are looking for the Sun Priestess. If you are not the Sun Priestess, they will kill you."

"And if I _am_ this Sun Priestess thing…?" Azula dares to ask. She receives only bitter stares. Maybe Sun Priestess is not a good person to be. It _sounds_ good, but Azula no longer trusts anything in the world. Trusting people, things or spirits never seems to work out for her. "That's not a good thing, is it?"

"Then they will not kill you."

"Oh."

Azula would kill them first.

 _ **###**_

"So, as far as I know I'm just a princess, not a priestess. Anyone want to tell me what that entails?"

"No."

 _ **###**_

"I'm having a baby. You can't possibly sacrifice me. Don't you have hearts?"

"No."

 _ **###**_

"There's this useless old man in the jungle somewhere, probably making tea… Do you think he might be the Sun Priestess? I mean—"

"No."

 _ **###**_

" _Who are we even waiting for_?"

"No."

"That isn't a valid answer!"

 _ **###**_

"I will kill—" Azula begins, but another guy enters. They all look the same.

"We're ready now," he announces.

"What, were your precious heroes sleeping?" she exasperatedly demands.

"Yes."

 _ **###**_

"That's my uncle. You captured my uncle?" Azula asks in disbelief. She has been sitting uncomfortably in the awful heat while _he_ was making _tea_ for these savages.

"I am sorry I didn't get you earlier," Iroh says and she clenches her fists. "They had to make preparations. I am certain you will be fine."

"You want to kill me," Azula says.

He waves his hands as if that revokes what he put her through today. "No, of course I don't."

"You _want to kill me_. These people want to sacrifice me!"

Iroh _chortles_. Azula is about to lose it. "You are overreacting. The spirits chose you, right? You are alive after two years comatose, you knew to ask those things. You... don't know what the _kuzet_ part is yet. Oh, I was going to tell you once we got off of the carriage but there was that spirit and, well..." He laughs. He _laughs_.

"That might have been useful information," she hisses.

"You look like your brother when you're irrationally angry," Iroh coos and Azula takes a deep breath.

"This is not irrational," she viciously snarls.

"Well, I don't know." He sighs and adopts a serious expression. " _Kuzet_ is a dragon blood. Or, well, a person with dragon blood. It's only carried on through women in our family, which there hasn't been in some time."

Azula sighs and burns off her bonds. She dares the Sun Warriors to try to tie her up again. "Nobody told me this. Ever."

"Nobody really believed in it anymore." Iroh turns his palms up while his niece's eyes narrow on him. "I didn't until my journey through the spirit world."

"You still didn't tell me."

Iroh frowns. "I felt it was best you didn't know about any infinite powers you had."

"That's fair enough," Azula has to admit. "Selfish, but I understand."

"Right. I don't know about Sun Priestesses, but believe me when I say that this is an important part of your spiritual journey to stop spirits from killing people."

"Fine." Azula looks at the tense warriors. "Take me to this sacrifice. Dying is better than living under Zuko's rules."

 _ **###**_

Azula begins to become nervous. She knows she should not be, but there is that same twisting and pounding in her that babies cannot possibly do. It's going to break her ribs, probably protesting the chance that Uncle is completely senile and she is going to die a horrible death.

She stands and allows herself to be set up for this.

So help her, she cannot believe she is doing this. Maybe it's another terrible dream. Maybe she never made it out of that grave.

The silence aches.

But then her vision flashes and she slips away in a snapping second.

The punching sensation inside of her is more powerful than the rumbling sensation outside of her.

Azula is in utter agony at first; the rending of herself and the creation of another makes her twist and writhe in searing pain, but when she wakes up the world is on fire... and it is so beautiful.


	7. Chapter Six

_**AN:**_ _This was inspired by Rosemary's Baby's final scene and I've caught up to it. If a certain scene within looks familiar, it's because it's inspired by Rosemary's Baby._

* * *

The fire burns and Azula knows that she is screaming.

She tries her best not to be ashamed of that reaction. Her head spins and she feels something pressing hard against her and then breaking her. Damp heat of blood trickles from the point of impact and she starts to feel dizzy. It is then that she fades away, into the brilliant colors, her mind fixated on the shades of blue that she had never imagined nor seen.

Azula comes half-way to and hears her uncle in a panic about _helping her_. She cannot believe he would do that when he sacrificed her. This is all his fault.

She feels pain. Agonizing pain.

Then she slips away again.

The next time she opens her eyes, Azula struggles to stay lucid.

She had been dressed in ceremonial garb while her uncle assured her that he believed in dragon blood. She had been marched during a chilling ceremony up towards a ledge. She had been standing there with no clue what to do when she saw dragons. Dragons, fire, and herself collapsing.

When she wakes, she is lying in a Sun Warrior bed. The ceremony must have ended, because she no longer hears chanting and dark singing.

She does not feel differently than before. In fact, she feels as if she never even had two dragons breathe fire all over her. It was beautiful. The colors were beautiful until they blended into blue and from that blue came a vision of the world on fire and dragons loose.

Then she realizes what has changed; she does not feel the baby punching at her insides.

Her hands fly to where the bump once was. There is no way she could have had a baby while in the middle of all of that.

Stiches and bandages soaked in herbs. There is no way that didn't _kill her_. She begins to wonder if she is cursed; she certainly didn't die after two years unconscious. She didn't die when she was thrown into a mass grave. She didn't die when something tore her insides out while fire cooked her.

Azula is untouched by the flames. Not quite startling, to be honest.

She does not remember bending to protect herself, but she must have.

Iroh walks in and Azula wants to shout at him. But her voice is sore and half-way vacant.

"I guess I didn't pass," Azula manages to say.

Iroh looks nervous when he replies, "You did pass. You would be dead if you did not. You also would have been dead without the help of very talented healers here."

"So, what's this about being Dragon Priestess? What do I do?" Azula does not know why that title sounds more appealing. It must be the blood loss messing with her head.

"I do not know yet. Do you want something to drink?"

"I just almost _died_. I don't want your tea." Azula leans back. Sitting up was a strain on the wound. "Did you know about the dragons? They're alive."

"They are dying," Iroh says sadly. Azula perks up through her haze. "The Sun Warriors told me that they are ill and fading, as the spirits attack and harm the people of the jungle."

"We have to help them," Azula says viciously. She catches herself and wonders why she cares about anyone or anything but herself. "Help the dragons."

Iroh examines her. "I do believe I was right about you. The spirits chose you because you are the only one of your kind. _But_ you would not be my first choice to help restore the Fire Nation's spiritual balance. To restore the dragons."

"Is the baby dead?" Azula inquires. She does not care about her magic blood or the spirits who sent her on this abhorrent quest. She wants to _know_.

Now Iroh looks more nervous. Azula has never seen him like this before.

"No. No, it is not," he says.

"Then something is wrong with it?" Azula can tell he is hiding something.

"You may be shocked and uncomfortable. I do not want to rush this when you are hurt."

" _Show me my child_ ," Azula snarls.

Iroh bends to her will, just this once. He knows she deserves it, but he is still pondering what to do with the information. He holds out a hand and Azula takes it, gnashing her teeth from the pain. She hopes she does not get a blood infection or she will haunt these savages _forever_.

Once she is on her feet, Iroh guides her to a very ornate room. Azula quickly realizes that it is a temple. It is a temple and Azula feels the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She does not like the idea that her baby is on the altar of savages.

She is brave. She is brave and she tugs on Iroh to move her faster. She knows that it would be very premature and it would be a miracle for it even to survive. She is not brave enough once she approaches the very masked cradle. She steps back and Iroh catches her by the arm.

"What's wrong with its eyes?" she whispers, because she saw the glint from afar. They are a little like hers but she wonders if she is a monster because it looks like one.

" _His_ eyes," corrects a beautiful Sun Warrior woman. She seems to be in charge of whatever freakish nightmare is in front of Azula. "Do you have a name for a boy?"

"Ryzu," Azula whispers, because she doesn't know what else to do.

Iroh is her anchor. Azula never thought she would _need_ him as much as she does right now. She is in ceremonial garb, half-ripped open after being sacrificed to dragons, and now there is something very wrong. Very wrong.

"Ryzu it is." The woman speaks warmly but Azula does not trust her.

Azula walks forward, because she has to do this. She _has to do this_.

She pulls back the blankets that must be protecting it from the cold. She notices candles burning fiercely all around it. Premature? She doesn't know.

Princess Azula has to force herself not to recoil. She refuses to show weakness at this point.

"That's not a baby, you lunatics," Azula says, taking a deep breath and stepping backwards. "But I am glad you have a backup for those dying ones that could have killed me."

"I did not think that the scrolls were so literal. I imagined it was figurative. I imagined it meant that she would give birth to more with dragon—"

Azula screeches, "Shut up about this _kuzet_ thing! I think I agree with my father that it's a fairy tale!"

"You see the evidence before you," Iroh says.

"That's not my baby. That's absurd. That's not even possible." Azula nearly falls as she stumbles backwards. She can barely control her sore limbs.

"Neither is staying alive as a corpse for two years. I know now that you were in the Spirit World at the time; your body was left behind but kept intact. When your spirit returned, your life returned, but you brought something with you. Do you remember anything from your journeys there?"

"It was less journeys and more meditation and frustration. They did show me a dragon egg and told me I could open it but there's a humongous difference of what comes out of eggs and what bursts out of my _chest_ ," Azula breathlessly declares, her eyes wide and burning.

"Bursts out of your womb. Significant difference, my priestess," corrects a girl that Azula wants to strangle to death.

"Yeah. Okay. Whatever. I want to go home." Azula feels so cold, even in the burning hot room. "This is clearly a bad dream. Maybe a hallucination. I could be hallucinating."

"This is real, and this is something you must confront."

"Take me home before I massacre you all." Azula turns. She hears a purring noise she cannot quite place.

Walking towards it is ridiculous, but she does it anyway. Her desire to _know_ overwhelms her desire to _escape_.

It is small, blue, alone. Dark blue and beautiful but its wings look pathetic. It's cute, like a kitten but with more nationalism. She does not like its eyes.

She reaches forward, rapt, and touches it.

A strong sensation ripples through her body.

Ryzu is hers. And _no one_ will take him from her.

No one.

 _ **###**_

Azula walks around the well-groomed ruins with her uncle. It is healer's orders for her to practice getting herself around as the injury heals. She is still too timid to even touch Ryzu, but she has accepted that even if it is madness, she would rather be the imprint of the first _true_ dragon than give that power to someone else.

Iroh suddenly stops. "I am sorry."

"For having me sacrificed?" Azula asks.

"No. For our past. Much of your hatred for me is my fault. I want you to understand that, and I mean my apology."

"You want my baby." Azula starts to walk away. He still follows her.

"What do you intend to do with what the spirits have given you?"

"They want revenge. I want revenge. So that's what it will be," Azula says.

Iroh sighs. "I want to know more before we-you do something drastic."

"And where do we get this information?" Azula asks.

"I do not know. But there will be records somewhere, I assure you."

"My brother will steal Ryzu. Our ancestors took the Fire Nation with dragons. We could take the world if we had them back. That is my destiny."

"That is not your destiny. That cannot be what the spirits want from you."

"Maybe it isn't. But it's what _I_ want. And I am tired of people trying to control me." Azula stops walking. "I am leaving with Ryzu tonight. You may accompany me if you wish."

She then leaves him behind.

Iroh tries to brace himself for what he knows is to come.

 _ **###**_

"She took my uncle," Zuko fiercely says, his hands clenched tightly on the table. Ty Lee nervously rubs her lips together. "Do you think she's holding him hostage?"

Ty Lee squirms; she does not like being put on the spot. She retired from political matters and is very happy about that. Being so _concerned_ all the time was super bad for her aura. Now she feels it slowly dying.

"Maybe _he_ took _her_ ," Ty Lee suggests. Zuko gives her that _look_ that people give her when she has said something they think is stupid. "He talked to her that day. Maybe she said something that he…"

Zuko will not believe her regardless of her efforts. She gives up before even finishing her thought.

"We have to go look for them," Zuko says and Ty Lee chews on her lip.

"Where? We don't know where they went and you can't leave the throne over this," Ty Lee whispers.

Zuko frowns. "I do have an idea of where they are. She talked about Ran and Shaw. If my uncle is cooperating with her at all, he would show her to them. We probably need help other than just us if that's where we're going… and if it's us who chase them."

Ty Lee nods. Azula is powerful enough on her own without Iroh and whoever Ran and Shaw are. Iroh wouldn't harm anyone, of course, but he is Zuko's weakness. The Fire Lord may be standing strong right now, but the minute he sees Iroh he will falter. And, well, Ty Lee feels the same way about Azula. They are the wrong people for this mission – or at least they shouldn't do it alone.

"Call Aang. I'd say Azula is a matter of world security and finding her is in his job description," Ty Lee says.

Zuko nods at her; he had the same idea.

 _ **###**_

Meanwhile, in the humid jungle, a young woman creeps into a temple like a shadow. And finds an old man waiting for her.

"What are you doing? You can't stop me," Azula says fiercely as she approaches the altar.

Uncle is there, waiting for her. She imagines he wants to prolong the imprisonment of his niece and her baby. Baby? Is she thinking of Ryzu as a baby?

He _is_ in a human cradle, but the fire burning beneath it as if boiling a pot of water reveals that he is far from human. Azula sometimes thinks if maybe her mother was truly right about calling her a monster.

"I want to help you." He clearly desires to guide her like he did Zuko. But Azula is not weak like her brother; she will not let him corrupt her.

But he might be soft enough to protect her from too much harm. Ryzu was a risk. People would _steal_ him and even if Azula struggled with maternal instinct, something primal inside of her growled with rage when she thought about him being stolen.

Him. Is he even a him? What is this and what is she doing?

"Then help me," Azula whispers just loud enough that he can hear.

"Come get him. We must go _now_."

Azula suddenly feels intense discomfort. She did not think much about the fact that she will have to confront Ryzu. The thought of holding him never crossed her mind until this moment.

She walks forward, hesitantly at first, and then reaches out one hand. He jumps up. Not jumps, no, but not flying either. Azula hadn't realized that he was in water, which is strange, but she tries not to think about it. His tail wraps loosely around her arm. And she looks him in his eyes.

Like a kitten, to be honest. She had one of those, a long time ago. Azula found it hiding in a dead fire fountain, and she managed to coerce Zuko into doing all of the dangerous work. That might be the only thing they ever worked together on.

Zuko buried the cat.

Azula always wanted to exhume it and build it a proper pyre, but that would be insane, and so she forgot.

She tries to think of it like that. Like how Ty Lee used to call her pets her babies and she treated them as such.

It isn't as if Azula gave _real_ birth, right?

That would be even more unsettling than the quiet observation from reptilian golden eyes.

"Are you alright?" Iroh inquires. He speaks softly, as if she is delicate. She _hates_ that tone of voice, but she does think he will be of use to her during her escape.

Wise tactics are more valuable to the princess than small annoyances.

"Yes. You said we should go _now_ , didn't you?" Azula asks and Iroh nods in response.

She follows him as Ryzu pries his way into her cloak with gentle claws. Azula has ignored worse pains, and so she just keeps going with Iroh as a very substantial human shield.

"Why was he in water?" Azula asks, the dragon damp against her skin.

"To keep him warm," Iroh explains.

"I saw the fire under him, I just didn't think…" Azula decides it is not worth asking.

They begin to walk towards where she was nearly sacrificed, and Azula's heartrate flares.

"What is it?" Iroh whispers.

Azula takes a slow, long, deep breath. "They said those dragons were dying."

"All things die," Iroh says and Azula rolls her eyes at him. She is not _two_. She knows death. She has given it to more than one human.

"They're sick, from whatever made the spirits so angry that they're attacking humans. We should help them," Azula thoughtlessly says. She cannot believe her own words, but there is a monster that came out of her currently latching itself to her clothes, so she is not that startled by strangeness.

Now Iroh is agape. Azula wishes she could enjoy that face, but she picks up her pace. He has every right to be surprised; Azula doubts she has ever wanted to _help_ anyone or anything.

"Azula, you cannot possibly mean to…?" He looks so marvelously hypocritical. "Perhaps they must be helped, but right now I have promised to help you with your escape, and I will not let you and Ryzu become endangered."

"I never truly saw them in the first place. The spirits told me to go here, and I didn't think much of them until… I'm now holding a dragon in my arms. I must speak to them," Azula protests. She sets off in long strides through the humid night air, heading towards the caves and sacrificial structure.

Iroh reluctantly follows.

Azula does not find Ran and Shaw, despite walking fearlessly into the caves. They seem to be more like caverns, going far and deep. She does not think she wants to delve into those depths.

She wonders if they are elsewhere. If they hunt or just get sacrifices. If they do not want to face her for some reason. It is kind of difficult to hide fully grown dragons, but they have vanished in a fashion that gives her gooseflesh.

As she scopes out the mouth of the second cave, she jumps from surprise. There is someone inside, waiting for her. Or at least looking as if she is waiting for her.

Azula stares and sees the milky color of her eyes. A blind old savage wearing a mystical necklace. Azula _hopes_ she is hallucinating.

Yet, the feeling is very real when the woman walks closer to her and Azula can smell the strong scent of incense that burns her eyes.

"What do want?" Azula demands as royally as she can.

The woman's weathered, filthy hands tremble as she gazes intently at Azula with those blind eyes. Although she cannot see, it feels like she can see into Azula's soul. That nearly makes the princess shiver. The blind soothsayer's lips part as if surprised.

Then she speaks. "You will do such terrible things that should be wondrous. Acts of good with intentions that poison them, and a terrible darkness—"

Azula yanks her hand away, deciding to take pity on the woman and not burn her too. Such words must be treason. They _are_ treason.

"You're not swindling me, peasant. I don't care for you savages and your vile opinions," Azula spits. She does not feel a drop of remorse for the soothsayer's frown.

And there is no more talk of her dark intentions and good deeds.

 _ **###**_

Azula finds nothing, and the moon is beginning to set by the time she is finished.

"This was a useless venture," Azula snaps as she and Iroh escape the city and enter the jungle. The sky is stained pink but the sun rises at a pace slower than molasses. "I'm tired and livid. I was promised an army of dragons and I can't even be face to face with two of them. And, oh, yes, Ryzu is all I need to claim the world."

"Claiming the world may not be the best of goals," Iroh says and Azula silences him with a glare. He does not want to touch this situation. "One dragon is more than enough to burn a hundred cities and attract the attention of thousands of people. Hunger for more will only lead to suffering."

"I _deserve_ more, is the thing. You forget that _hunger_ is a basic need."

Ryzu seems to decide that is an appropriate time to claw at her skin. Hunger is a basic need…

"What does he eat?" Azula asks, noticing that Uncle also looks concerned about Ryzu's possible starvation. _As if he could do better_ , Azula thinks to herself.

"Meat," Iroh says. It is the best answer he can give.

Azula rolls her eyes.

"I _know_ dragons eat _meat_ , Uncle. But I imagine feeding him is probably more specific than _meat_. What were the Sun Warriors feeding him?" Azula demands coldly.

"They made… sacrifices." He looks so uncomfortable with what he allowed happen, in Azula's opinion. She does not put any thought into the fact that Iroh could have been doing what he had to do in order to keep Ryzu alive.

"Are you volunteering yourself? You're probably two weeks of baby dragon food."

"They were _animal_ sacrifices. I probably should have specified that…" He trails off in thought for a moment. "You were going to hunt that sun bear."

"Because _that_ turned out so well for me. I'm also not risking my own life, because all Ryzu will have is you to watch him and you might _slay_ him. I've done a lot of amoral things in my life, but I would never kill a dragon, much less the last one."

"You just met two."

"Yes. Amazing how you resisted murdering them in cold blood."

Iroh opens his mouth to express how wrong but right that statement is, but he decides it is not in the best interest of Ryzu to make Azula think he is intending to steal the dragon. That seems to be a dangerous concern of hers at the moment.

"Yes, very amazing," Iroh mutters. Zuko was more difficult at times, and not ever holding a flightless, helpless baby of a beyond endangered species.

"Why don't we compromise? You hunt a sun bear, and I will wait here under this tree and tend to the claw marks in my side."

"You didn't tell me he was scratching you."

"Right. So you can take him and run."

"Do you believe I could outrun you?"

Azula says nothing. Iroh takes that as a small victory, but probably not a compliment.

"I have reason to suspect you. You're being _nice_ to me. You want my baby."

"I want to make sure he survives, which is very reasonable of me."

"You want to give him to Zuko," Azula snaps.

"I do not think that would be wise," Iroh says honestly. "I am certain he needs you."

"Yes," she lies. Azula is not so confident about her parenting, seeing as she has not managed to find a way to feed him ye, much less train him to lead her conquest and burn the Earth Kingdom to the ground.

That _was_ her idea. And it would've worked too, if it weren't for her meddling brother and uncle… and her incompetent father, if she's being thorough.

Azula sits down beneath a dripping tree and waits for Iroh to hunt a sun bear.

 _ **###**_

"That is a rabbit-mouse. That is not a bear. I asked for a bear."

Azula is sitting, shadowy from the sunset above the trees, waiting for him and staring at the small supposedly-extinct-animal sitting on her lap making mewling noises at her. She has not quite known what to do, but she did touch his nose once, which didn't give her many answers.

"I think that might be slightly wasteful," Iroh says.

"I think I don't care what you think is wasteful." Azula just sighs and gives in; she does not have a choice. "Fine then. You can break its legs."

His nephew may have been difficult and spoiled, but at least Zuko just screamed insults. Iroh does not think Zuko would ever ask him to break a helpless animal's legs. He thinks he would not do that and would hit his nephew on the back of the head for suggesting it. His niece is different in many ways, and he underestimated that before setting out to help her.

"The Sun Warriors burnt them."

"I bet that's what a mother dragon would do. That makes sense. I will burn it if you are such a coward."

"I'm not a coward. I would kill it before burning it because I believe that burning things alive is inhumane and—"

Azula tries to grab it from him and nearly trips. She catches herself and snatches the whimpering furball.

"Should I apologize to it first, or something?"

It works. It is messy, but it works.

Azula stares at Ryzu eat and Iroh feels that pang of concern. The spirits seem to have a sense of humor. Although, it is what she was born to do, and he has hope that she will realize that before the end. She looks pensive in the worst of ways.

They built a campfire because night has fallen and neither of them want to travel through this place in the dark. The sounds of animals they do not want to cross, coupled with the spirit attacks of late, are not encouraging.

"He's good at ripping things apart," Iroh suggests. He thinks perhaps that might be the way to talk to her.

"Yes. He is. He is not a human baby." And _that_ is what is troubling her.

Iroh supposes it would be uncanny and disturbing to anyone.

"Where are you planning to take him?" Iroh inquires.

"As if I would tell you," Azula scathingly snaps. "I am taking him where I will take him to help him grow up and turn into the weapon he was born to be."

Iroh is silent before replying, "You sound like your father."

"Did he ever actually act so blatantly about me? I never knew." The princess laughs.

Iroh watches Ryzu walk around the small campsite.

The dragon is the size of a human toddler – he has grown quickly – yet he is about as formidable as a human toddler. He cannot fly yet, nor can he breathe more than smoke, and therefore cannot hunt for himself or defend himself – Azula must do those things for him.

She must be _trusted_ to do those things for him.

And Iroh does not like the idea of trusting Azula.

The princess looks up at her uncle when Ryzu screeches. She then looks at her dragon, then back at her uncle.

"I had hoped he wouldn't cry like real babies do. I also had hoped that all those mothers were right when they say you just _know_ what they want," Azula complains.

"Thank you for being so open and honest with me," Iroh says.

"Oh shut up," Azula snaps in response. She takes Ryzu on her lap and he stops screeching. "I need to figure him out before we're on our own. Your help will kill him, you know."

"I could accompany you to your final destination," Iroh suggests yet again.

Azula glares.

She has every intention to take Ryzu to Ember Island. She knows where she would hide and what she would do. Ryzu has to grow up before he conquers the world; she must bide her time. The jungle ends at the ocean and she knows she can procure a ship to sail there.

"How did you know the Sun Warriors? I thought they were extinct," Azula inquires, her eyes on the campfire and not her uncle.

"You thought dragons were extinct too." Iroh clears his throat. "I met them long ago, when I was younger. I spared Ran and Shaw after meeting the lost people and brought back a claw as evidence of their supposed deaths."

"You didn't slay the last dragon?"

"No. No, I did not."

Azula harrumphs.

"I have gained a small amount of respect for you," she says and Iroh looks surprised. "What? I always though the slaughter of the dragons was disgusting. They say the royal family is descended from them, they say that we tamed them, they say that they were the force behind our ancestors' first conquest. I thought it was foolish to waste that power by hunting them. Perhaps if we still had dragons, we could have won the war."

There is no sound but the jungle animals and dripping water.

Iroh understands her reasoning. It seems like something his niece would believe.

"If it were not for your father," he earnestly says, "I think you would have been an admirable Fire Lord."

"I love my father," Azula spits. "No one can change that."

Iroh does not argue. She did not choose the life Ozai gave her.

"Speaking of him, you might be getting in over your head. Your enemies have—"

"Yes, Zuko has the support of four nations and an army and the Avatar, but I have _a dragon_. It's not a fight they can win."

"That might be a misuse of having a dragon." That was a last ditch effort, Iroh has to admit.

Azula laughs. "That's precisely the use of having a dragon. It's what our ancestors did with them. It's what anyone would do with a dragon. What? You think majestic beasts that can burn entire cities like I can burn a leaf are meant to put in a petting zoo or ride around on?"

"I am not going to talk you out of your plan, am I?" he says.

Azula gives him a quite unkind glance. "It's not much of a plan yet. More of a goal. But no, you will not."

Iroh stares into the campfire and tries to reassure himself that she is wrong.

That she is not more of a monster than her child.


	8. Chapter Seven

"Ryzu!" Azula screams into the darkness. She is panicked and drenched in blood. Dripping brownish-red, matted in her hair, and she does not seem aware of it or the stench; she is too focused on her lost child. "Ryzu! Ryzu! Ryz—!"

From behind, someone clamps their sweaty hand over her mouth. She thrusts her elbow backwards, breaks free, and swings a flaming arm down on the assailant. Iroh grabs her by the wrist and she steps back.

"Did you swim in blood?" Iroh whispers, his russet eyes wide. He wipes at the residue left on his damp clothes.

"Yes. I actually did. Well, more like _dove into it_ …" Azula shakes her head and looks up over her shoulder. This cavern is humongous, so large that she does not know how she will find the tiny dragon that desperately needs her. Even without the task of finding Ryzu, escaping this place will be no easy feat.

"Are you looking for a way out?" Iroh inquires, narrowing his eyes and scanning the underground cliffs.

"No. I'm looking for my son. Or did you not hear me screaming his name?" Azula snarls. Her eyebrow twitches and she sucks in a deep, foul-tasting breath. "Have you seen him?"

Iroh shrugs. How helpful. Azula knew there was a good reason that she hates her uncle.

How did she get into this position? The Sun Warriors were not as comfortable with Azula just taking Ryzu and vanishing into the jungle. They had seemed sane until Azula woke up in this nightmare. She has to admit it wounds her pride to have been taken by surprise by these savages twice now.

Knocked out in the rainforest, waking up in a compromising position. She hopes this does not become routine.

"I plan on helping you find Ryzu," Iroh says, of course. "Do not worry." As if that will make her stop worrying. He is so full of it, but Azula does not have many options for allies at this point. "He's somewhere here."

"Where is here? I woke up on a cliff in a really itchy blanket… but that… why did I say the itchy part? Oh, who cares. You won't be helping me. You will be staying here while I find him," Azula snaps, trying to keep her composure.

Iroh frowns. "I do not think you can find him on your own, much less care for him."

Azula crosses her arms. "You believe I am ill-equipped to care for my own child?" Azula demands, her nose pointed towards the stone ceiling.

Iroh sighs.

"Yes. I do. Do you know anything about caring for him?" Iroh inquires.

"I figured out what he eats!" Azula argues.

"He needs you. You need me," Iroh firmly says. "I do not want either of you to be harmed."

"You don't want _Ryzu_ to be harmed. But, as his mother, I should put his wellbeing before my own. You may help me escape this place and we will discuss a partnership again then," Azula declares regally, her arms still tightly crossed.

Iroh again surrenders his pride for the sake of the last dragon.

"Let's keep walking. Without screaming his name this time," Iroh suggests.

Azula is loath to admit that she does not have a better idea.

 _ **###**_

Meanwhile, inside of the palace, Aang tries to comprehend the information that Zuko yells. Katara looks as confused as he feels, but Ty Lee seems to understand perfectly.

"So, okay, Azula kidnapped Iroh?" Aang tries once Zuko stops shouting to catch his breath.

"He might have gone willingly," Zuko swiftly corrects. He is not making this any easier to understand.

"But he's definitely with her?" Aang cocks an eyebrow.

"Probably. They both disappeared at the same time. And…" Zuko glances at Ty Lee and Katara. He wants to get Aang alone so he can explain the Sun Warrior portion of the puzzle. It is what explains Azula and Iroh's vanishing best.

"But you do have an idea of where they went?" Katara interjects, desperate to get this over with.

"Yes," Zuko says firmly.

 _ **###**_

In the caverns, Azula sits down. This place might as well be an unsolvable labyrinth. Her gut keeps twisting with the knowledge that Ryzu is somewhere, probably in danger, in need of her, and she is walking around in a _cave_ with Iroh.

She is so scared that she will lose him, but she does not want Iroh to know that.

She is so scared of the fact that those Sun Warriors who managed to capture her are probably looking for her by now.

But Azula cannot be afraid because she is supposed to be a fearless conqueror.

Even in this dreadful place.

Even with her son kidnapped.

She was raised to be ruthless and she will not turn her back on who she always has been and who she is destined to be. She will not let go of her valor, even if it kills her.

 _ **###**_

Zuko finally gets Aang alone. He is incredibly relieved by that fact. They stand in the chiaroscuro of the setting sun on an obsidian balcony. Aang nods over and over; he finally gets the situation – and gets that it is a dire one.

"So, the only problem is that I have no idea where we found the Sun Warriors," Aang admits openly.

Zuko grimaces. He has the same problem.

"We could retrace or steps?" Zuko attempts. He thinks it might be feeble.

Aang rubs his forehead, creasing and smoothing the blue arrow.

"I don't have a better idea." Aang tries to be chipper, but Azula is a daunting problem when he is already struggling to deal with the spirit attacks. He hates how bad of a job he is doing at being the bridge between worlds. Aang has not been able to find out why it is happening or how to stop it.

Now Azula goes to find dragons and, for some reason, brings Iroh.

It all gives him a bad vibe.

Meanwhile, inside, Ty Lee is stuck with Katara. Or Katara is stuck with Ty Lee. One or the other; they both like each other but don't have the best conversations.

"She doesn't worry me anymore," Ty Lee lies in response to Katara's concerned comments. Ty Lee smiles and hopes that covers up her deception.

Katara does not know if she should let Ty Lee keep lying to herself or not. She decides what she decides and hopes for the best.

"She does worry you. You're still in love with her," Katara says, shrugging. She cannot put it in a simpler or kinder way.

"No. No, I'm not! Of course I'm note!" Ty Lee knows she is protesting to vehemently; anyone could see through that. "Maybe a little."

"It's okay," Katara warmly says. "No one could blame you for still being in love with someone, even if you love your husband. We don't choose who we love. I can blame you for loving Azula, because that is honestly beyond my understanding, but…"

"We don't have a chance together," Ty Lee says, but means the opposite.

"Either way, your feelings won't just magically disappear overnight," Katara says.

"I should've made an effort."

"Huh?"

"With her after the war. I never stop thinking about the things I didn't say. I've never said I'm sorry." Ty Lee wrings her hands and wonders if she can salvage any of her positivity at this point.

Katara snorts. "Sorry for what?"

"For breaking her heart," Ty Lee says honestly. She sinks into her seat. "Time doesn't heal all wounds. That's what people who're smarter than me say, but I don't believe them."

Katara purses her lips, thinking for a moment. Ty Lee gazes out of the window and tries to appreciate the glorious sunset like she always does. It feels hard at the moment.

"No, time doesn't. You're right about that," Katara says. "Let's find her and you can apologize." Not that Katara thinks Ty Lee owes Azula an apology in the first place.

Ty Lee does not stop thinking about Azula anymore, ever since they found her.

Azula's words about Ty Lee's true fear haunt the Fire Lady: that she is afraid Azula will destroy her marriage and her life.

Missing or not, her feelings for Azula have already wrecked it all.

 _ **###**_

Azula wanders the dark and frightening halls with Iroh by her side.

"I don't trust you," she whispers. Keeping her voice down and her footsteps silent is vital at the moment. "I doubt I ever well."

He whispers back, "The feeling is mutual. You _did_ nearly kill me with a sneak attack, but we do not need to trust each other in order to save Ryzu.

Azula silently agrees with him. They keep moving without another word.

The further they go in the cavern, the more like a temple it seems to be. Azula thought it was a disgusting prison when she first wound up stuck in here.

She sees an altar like the one she found Ryzu in after she bore him. Azula runs towards him before Iroh can stop her. Hands, blades and flames come from everywhere.

"Leave her alive!" shouts a priest, but Azula just sees that as more of a reason to fight.

She bursts into blue flames, illuminating the entire cavern. Iroh joins in without hesitation, taking down several of the warriors with his potent bending and quick wits. They fight until only smoke and bodies remain, and Azula grabs Ryzu. He makes a pleased purring sound and digs his claws into her skin.

"I will never let you be taken from me again," Azula whispers to him as Iroh watches in awe.

Azula is wrong, for once Iroh finds the way out, the first and last thing Azula sees is the Avatar soaring at her.

 _ **###**_

Princess Azula claws at Fire Lord Zuko and lights ablaze. Iroh quickly takes her by the arms to stifle the flames. She has just woken from her unconscious state, and saw her brother holding Ryzu in his arms. She can see the fear in her son's eyes and she wants to rip Zuko's throat out with her teeth, fire be damned. She tried to reclaim him and was denied.

"HE IS MY CHILD AND YOU WILL NOT TAKE HIM FROM ME!" Azula shrieks at the top of her lungs, struggling against Iroh's grip. She does not know why she cannot break free of him. "YOU WILL NOT STEAL MY BABY, YOU SON OF A—"

"I'm sorry," Ty Lee murmurs, and with a few quick punches, she disables the princess.

Azula glares at Ty Lee, even when she sees the tears that drip from the Fire Lady's eyes. It hurts Ty Lee to hurt Azula, but she knew that this would end poorly if she did not intervene.

Ty Lee disappears down the shadowy hallway, sobbing uncontrollably over her actions.

Sobbing uncontrollably over her lingering love for Azula.

 _ **###**_

After Azula calms down, Zuko has her restrained and brought to the throne room. As soon as his preceding audience ends, the soldiers ease her to the stone floor. She feels sick groveling to Zuko, but she needs to have Ryzu.

She _needs_ him.

"Explain to me how Ryzu came to be," Zuko orders from his throne.

"I was pregnant when I left. That does not require being a genius to figure it out," Azula snarls. She glares at the floor beneath her and grinds her teeth.

"You… gave birth to a dragon?" Zuko asks in utter believe. He feels certain that she is lying.

"Yes. I was fairly revolted and shocked too. But I've come to l-l-like him," Azula says, evading the word 'love' at all costs. It does not matter that it is her child; she will not say it. "He needs my protection. He cannot eat without me, he cannot fly yet, he cannot breathe fire yet. He needs his mother."

 _Mother_. Azula believes what she is saying, even if Zuko doubts it. _Mother_ , she calls herself.

Mother of a dragon.

Mother of a… dragon. _Mother of a dragon_. Where has Zuko heard that phrase before? He pushes it to the back of his mind to figure out later.

"You want him as a weapon," Zuko says.

"He is my son. He may be dangerous, but would you expect a child of mine not to be?" Azula sees that she makes no progress. "I will slaughter anyone who tries to keep him from me, no matter the consequence, brother."

Zuko locks eyes with her through the orange flames. She breaks down crying and he can tell she is not faking it. He has seen her cry like that before, in the depths of her madness. Her fake crying is a far less perturbing sound.

He stands. "What do you want from me?"

"Let me see him _now_ before I burn this palace to the ground," she orders through her tears. She does not sound regal; she sounds agonized.

Zuko gives in when he sees that. They may have their problems with each other, but he cannot see her in so much pain without feeling sick.

"You can see him, but you have to be supervised," Zuko says. He means it.

Azula does not thank him when they rise and he leads her to the room that holds Ryzu. When she enters and moves directly to the small blue dragon, Zuko turns to Iroh.

"Did that really… come out of her?" Zuko asks slowly.

Iroh nods. "I watched it happen. It was bloody and unusual, but she did absolutely give birth to him. I think she has accepted the fact that he is her son."

"I don't get it."

"Some things are best left unexplained, nephew."

"So you know how or why?"

Iroh decides to change the subject. "You should be wary of how you treat Ryzu. There is nothing a woman will not do to protect her child, and your sister is lethal. He is your nephew anyway. Don't you want to be as good of an uncle as I am?"

Iroh laughs.

Zuko does not; he just watches, transfixed, as Azula burns a mouse alive and Ryzu devours it with his sharp fangs.

 _ **###**_

Fire Lord Zuko goes to the Dragon Bone Catacombs after his dinner. He cannot get that familiar phrase out of his head. Mother mixed with dragon. He _knows_ it means _something_.

He decides to seek the scrolls about dragons first. It seems logical enough.

Zuko finds no mention of the phrase, only explanations of mother dragons. He takes one of them that seems most useful; it is intended for humans tending to orphaned dragons.

He then decides to move to the history of the Royal Family. If anything would cause Azula to be strange, it would be her – their – lineage.

Zuko digs for a good amount of time before he finds it scrawled on the outside of an archaic scroll.

 _The Legend of the Dragon-Mother Empress._

Zuko unrolls it and begins to read.

 _ **###**_

Zuko never knew the story wholly. He heard jumbled bits and pieces of an undying legend of dragons and warlords. It is the tale of the rise of the Royal Family, and it is never told the same way twice. But now Zuko has the official record of the story… and it might not be a myth.

Sozin burned copious amounts of his nation's history. The bonfires of scrolls effected both the Fire Nation, the Earth Kingdom and the Air Nomads. People celebrated that destruction, not knowing how unfortunate it is to lose important information.

Fire Lord Zuko understands, however; Sozin wanted to cover is tracks because his actions were inexcusable. It still sickens him, understandable motives or not.

He knows why this scroll was spared; it glorifies the days of warlords and conquests. Zuko would have thought it to be a fairy tale and propaganda if he had not seen Ryzu and Azula with his own two eyes.

The scroll tells of a secret carried by the female royal bloodline. The last daughter was two generations before Sozin. Maybe that is why the girl in this story might as well be mythical. Her power had been forgotten, and Azula somehow woke it from its two centuries of slumber.

The dragons were the only thing more lethal than mankind. They dominated the tribes led by warlords and burned the rudimentary villages. One girl, however, rose up, an tamed one. With that dragon, she fought for the glory of her father – a strong warlord – and claimed the Fire Nation with nothing but a dragon and a handful of loyal soldiers.

Azula has both of those things at her fingertips.

This scroll is about how the royals being descended from dragons is literal, but to Zuko it is about how much of a threat Azula is to peace and balance.

Ryzu could conquer the Fire Nation with Azula guiding him and the New Ozai Society convinced to side with her. Zuko could not take Ryzu and tame him; he is loyal to his mother and Zuko never forgave himself for losing his own.

Zuko picks up the scroll, gets his bearings and heads off to find Iroh.

Every move he makes could cause a disaster.

That seems to be how Zuko's reign as Fire Lord goes.

 _ **###**_

"Ryzu," Iroh says over tea, "is valuable beyond warfare. The spirits are angry. Ryzu may be integral to the solution. The spirit attacks must stop; would you not do everything in your power to protect the people of your nation?"

"Of course I would," Zuko snaps, loudly setting down his teacup. "But don't act like Azula isn't going to misuse a _dragon_ for her own personal gain. Uncle, she is going to start another war."

Iroh rubs his chin and takes two sips of tea. Zuko has not felt so agitated in years. He had calmed down, but now he is definitely losing his cool on a regular basis. Iroh decides to neglect to mention that Azula _does_ see Ryzu as a weapon. The thing is, he feels more loyalty to the peace and safety of the world than to his nephew.

The less Zuko knows at the moment, the better. Iroh has his own plans to get close to Azula and begin to groom Ryzu to aid the spirits in restoring peace instead of seeking a way to go to war.

"Azula is undecided," Iroh says, after proper thought. "She will not strike until she is strong enough. We have time to help her before she does that."

"I know her better than you do. "I know that the world isn't enough for Azula. Ryzu is—"

"My child. And I know what happens to a child when you treat them like a weapon. They eventually break and go completely insane," interrupts Azula.

Zuko looks over his shoulder and sees her standing in the dim light with her arms crossed. She looks terrifying, but he is not afraid.

"I'm not saying…" Zuko does not know what he is saying. "Father did slightly a little bit destroy the lives of thousands of innocent people, including you. I'm not insinuating that you'd treat Ryzu like father treated you."

Azula steps closer. Zuko prepares for a fight.

"Yes, yes you are saying exactly that. Father saw me as a weapon of conquest. You say that I see Ryzu the same way. Ryzu is too young to be a threat. I am not certain how I will feel about world domination when he grows up. Uncle is…" Azula looks like she has just sipped something both bitter and sour. "is right about the spirits. They put me up to this, since you have done nothing to rebuild the broken Fire Nation, and instead have focused on appeasing others."

"Don't blame the spirit attacks on me!" Zuko snaps. Iroh carefully observes; Azula glares.

"But you _are_ to blame for them," Azula replies, walking closer. She rests her hands on Zuko's shoulders and slowly turns him. He allows her to do it, because he is very confused and fairly angry.

"Who told you?" Zuko asks, looking her straight in the eye.

Azula digs her nails into his shoulders and then pulls away before she does anything worse to him.

"I was held hostage in the Spirit World for two years. It was very unpleasant and I do not appreciate you overlooking what I have done through. I was dead, ZuZu. I am back for a reason, I was held there for a reason, and I will find that reason if it is the last thing I do," Azula smoothly says, leaning on the wall and letting the shadows engulf her.

"And they _chose_ you or something?" Zuko snorts.

"Yes. Exactly that."

Azula loses her patience and leaves.

 _ **###**_

Azula is tossing books from the Dragonbone Catacombs at the wall. They are useless in both finding her an information or satisfying her overwhelming rage.

A knock on the door interrupts her before she prepares to kick over a stack of scrolls.

Slowly, Azula walks across the room and opens the door. Ty Lee stands there, her arms crossed and her expression nervous. She had to work up a lot of courage to go here and she hopes that Azula will not turn her away.

"What do you want?" Azula demands.

"I wanted to see Ryzu," Ty Lee replies. Azula deems her honest.

"He is sleeping at the moment, but you may come in," Azula says, stepping aside.

"That was easier than I thought," Ty Lee chimes. She looks around at the many books and scrolls. It does not take a genius to know that Azula is researching why she had Ryzu and what she should do with him.

Azula guides Ty Lee to the small bed, soft, tucked into the corner. Ty Lee reaches to touch him but Azula grabs her hand and holds her back.

"You may see him. You may not touch him," Azula says.

"Can I see you?" Ty Lee asks. She turns to face the princess. "Can I touch you?"

Azula releases Ty Lee's wrist. "No. You never will, because you have betrayed me more than once. I hope you are very happy with my brother until the day one of you dies."

Ty Lee sits back on her heels and does not remove her gaze from Azula.

"I didn't think I would ever see you again. You were gone. I got with him because I missed you so much. I hoped maybe you'd come back, maybe you'd forgive me, maybe he'd forget that he was second best. I lost that hope. I lost all of those hopes a long time ago," Ty Lee says.

Azula carefully considers her answer.

"I am sorry for your loss."

That's it.


	9. Chapter Eight

Fire Lord Zuko watches the man enter the throne room.

The old man bows deeply and makes a brief pained face from the motion of his back. He looks nervous, and Zuko feels sorry for him. Whatever he says must be difficult to voice.

"There's been another spirit attack," the man says. He does not sound timid; he just looks it.

"Yes?" Zuko replies, remaining calm. Internally, he is panicking. These attacks keep getting worse and worse. Aang cannot come fast enough. At least he is on his way.

"It didn't seem like one until the… _thing_ vanished," says the man and Zuko cocks an eyebrow.

"Why didn't it?" the Fire Lord asks.

"People thought it was a dragon." Now he sounds as anxious as he appears. "I know that sounds insane but there was so much fire, and there are other witnesses and—"

Fire Lord Zuko holds up a hand to stop him from continuing.

"Don't worry. I believe you." His stomach does backflips.

Is this coincidence? He cannot figure out if Ryzu and Azula have anything to do with a spirit in the form of a dragon.

"It was so… _real_ ," the man says. "I know that all spirits are real but – it looked like a real one but they're all dead – and nobody knows what to do about it."

"I'll send people to help clean the town and tend to anyone wounded," Zuko replies and the man bows again, murmuring a breathy _thank you_.

Zuko gazes into the flames.

This is bad.

 ** _###_**

Aang arrives a few hours after Zuko dispatches soldiers and medics to help with the aftermath of the spirit – or dragon – attack. They nod at each other, glad to reunite.

"I heard about what's happening. It's weird. Spirits don't do that," Aang says and Zuko wants to snap that he is being awfully unhelpful. "I guess unless they're angry about something. But why would so many be angry? I… I promise I'll figure it out. I can go into the Spirit World and fix this."

Zuko hopes it will be that easy.

"Do you need to go somewhere specific for it?" Zuko asks and Aang shrugs.

"Somewhere where I won't lose my body." His lips twitch and Zuko gestures for him to follow.

He guides Aang to a private room and lingers for a moment before leaving him to his Avatar work. This will work; Zuko knows it will.

Aang is the bridge between worlds, isn't he?

 ** _###_**

Ty Lee watches Azula with Ryzu.

Azula sits on the floor, which is very unusual for her, and her eyes do not leave that shimmery blue creature. She gently plays with it; Ty Lee finds that to be the most transfixing thing.

"I know you're hiding behind that wall," Azula says suddenly. Ty Lee flinches, startled. "You can come in if you want. This is a very open room."

Ty Lee enters and takes a deep breath. She walks over and sits down a little way away from Azula and Ryzu. She is closer, but not too close. They both are dangerous.

She feels like an outsider, and usually she can fit in anywhere she goes. This just feels wrong. Having Azula back feels wrong, because it took Ty Lee so much effort and pain to get over her. Then the princess shows up like she did nothing wrong.

Ryzu approaches Ty Lee and Azula's gaze follows him. Ty Lee holds out her trembling hand and smiles at the dragon. She does not know if dragons understand smiles, but it is better to be safe than sorry.

He bows his head down slightly and Ty Lee reaches to touch him, kind of like a cat. She feels bad calling Azula's child a _cat_ , but Ty Lee does not know the right words for it.

Azula approaches, probably to protect her child from horrid Ty Lee or something.

The minute she sits down, Ryzu seems to change his mind about being touched and Ty Lee suddenly feels agonizing pain in her hand. He _bit_ her. She just was bitten by a dragon.

But that is not the strangest thing about the bite that makes her scream. Her wrist is grabbed and her hand examined.

"We need to clean this," says Azula and Ty Lee looks at her, befuddled.

She looks concerned. Azula stands and goes into the other room. Ty Lee stands and moves away from Ryzu; she never wants to be close to him ever again.

Azula returns with water and cloth. She takes Ty Lee's wrist without permission again and cleans it before wrapping the bandage. Her fingers linger when she realizes what she has done. Azula does not know why she reacted like this. She should have left Ty Lee on her own.

Is this romantic?

Is it?

"Your reflexes dulled with age, I see," Azula whispers, pulling away. Ty Lee sees it too. Their eyes meet and they avert them simultaneously.

"I guess yours didn't."

Ty Lee does not know what else to say.

Is there anything else that can be said?

 ** _###_**

"It is dangerous," Iroh admits to his nephew. "It is _too_ dangerous," he adds.

The two men are having tea and discussing the spirit attacks. Azula and Ryzu came up, of course, because that is the most alarming situation at the moment. It is much, much more than the attacks.

Zuko suggested Aang interfering with Ryzu.

Iroh denied him.

But now his uncle seems to have come to his senses.

"What am I supposed to do about that? I'm very confused about the Ryzu situation and I'm pretty sure that anything I do will be wrong," Zuko says. He sees that twinkle in his uncle's eyes and barks, "Don't tell me I have to figure this out myself! _You_ snuck her out of the house, _you_ keep siding with her nonstop for some reason, _you_ brought Ryzu here and I'm thinking that _you_ should make some suggestions."

Iroh is calm. He is calm in a fashion that makes Zuko's stomach hurt. He never gets angry like most people. That is probably why he is more successful at raising a child than Ozai. Or most people in general.

"I was going to make a situation, nephew," says Iroh. "Azula wants to stay with Ryzu, but we are lying down in front of the lion-wolf and offering it our necks. Those who tamed dragons had places they kept them. They didn't just keep them in the garden. It is dilapidated now, I am certain, but Sozin kept his own dragon in a tower that still exists."

"She won't be separated from Ryzu. That's our problem."

"We will not separate her from Ryzu. We will separate them both from us, and keep them somewhere where they cannot easily escape."

"So, you're suggesting we lock them up in dragon prison?" Zuko has to hold back laughter.

"Not exactly but I was going to suggest well-trained armed guards and constant surveillance."

"She won't agree." Zuko shakes his head and sets down his tea.

"If you phrase it properly, she will," Iroh replies confidently.

Zuko sighs at Iroh's persistence. And his idealism when it comes to that dragon.

"There is no way we can make dragon prison sound like a vacation home," Zuko says.

"I was thinking more of an ultimatum." Iroh finishes his tea and waits for Zuko to respond.

"That doesn't sound like what you usually preach," the Fire Lord states.

"I think it is the only thing that will work. We have given her far too much power over us. We need to reclaim at least some of it for our good and hers."

Zuko agrees.

 ** _###_**

Azula stares at the building. It looks like it is built out of the same material the palace is made of; it looks royal, despite a few crumbling portions. She better not get crushed by rocks after complying to this ridiculous idea.

The soldiers guide her, with Ryzu in her arms, behind Iroh and Zuko as they walk up the overgrown dirt path.

"It just needs a little touching up," Iroh says, trying not to cringe.

"A little touching up? You can't honestly be forcing me to stay here," Azula says, trying not to just murder all of them and run off with Ryzu.

"It is for your own good," Iroh says.

Azula glares at him.

"No. It's for everyone's good but mine."

 _ **###**_

"It is cold. You will make this place habitable or I will not cooperate. You do not want to see me when I am not cooperating."

"I've seen it," Zuko says. "It's unpleasant. I'm not giving in to your demands – you're in no position to make them – but I agree that this is not an okay thing to do to a person. Uncle, you seemed pretty assured that this was a good idea."

"I said it needed touching up." Iroh shrugs and Zuko shakes his head.

"What if we stay with you until _someone_ gets us what we need to make it decent?" Zuko offers and Iroh's expression sours. He clearly does not like that idea, but Zuko thinks it is wise.

"I accept," Azula says, and no one feels like pressuring the girl with a dragon in her arms any further.

Zuko has to admit she is more cooperative than she ever has been before, which is alarming. She has a _dragon_ and she is not locked up, yet she has not made a violent move yet. It makes Zuko think that perhaps she has one planned for the future.

"We should find a place with a roof that hasn't caved in," Zuko suggests and Azula nods. "You walk in front."

Azula does not argue and that makes Zuko twice as nervous. He does not like the unknown, and he does not like the fact that he knows it can only be bad.

She holds Ryzu closer to her as they enter the abandoned tower.

 _ **###**_

"What's wrong, Aang?" Katara asks as soon as she arrives. He is pacing when she walks into the palace, and he seems to have been doing it for some time. "Is everything okay? No one is telling me what she did."

Aang stops pacing and turns to face her.

"Uh, well, huh. It's complicated." He squints. It is not easy to explain Ryzu and Azula's current situation. "But what's wrong right now is the Spirit World."

"Did you find out something bad about the spirit attacks?"

"No. I _wish_. It's way worse than that: I couldn't even get in or find my way. It was. . . _blank_ there, and then my connection severed. That's not supposed to happen. I mean, half of my whole job is being a bridge between worlds." He rubs his sore neck.

She frowns.

"What does that mean?" Katara asks.

"I don't know." Aang feels very cold on a very hot day.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee tosses and turns in bed. Her sheets become tangled and her legs contorted as she tries to rid herself of the thoughts that haunt her. She cannot stop thinking about the metaphorical spark she felt when Azula helped her with that bite. Every time she sees the bandage on her hand she thinks about it and feels sick to her stomach.

Of course there are still feelings. It was just unresolved. That is all. She never got a clean ending with Azula, and so it bothers her. The feelings are not real; they just will linger until she properly disposes of them.

She stares at the ceiling and sighs a long sigh. Her body is coated with sweat. Her head is racing. Her hands keep fidgeting.

Ty Lee does not think she will be sleeping tonight.

 _ **###**_

Azula cannot find any comfort on the sheets laid out for her, layered on each other as if they could make a comfortable mattress. The first thing she demands will be a bed here. The second thing will be for Ryzu to stop chewing on her hair.

"Stop. Stop it. Stop," she hisses.

Zuko overhears and sits up. He was almost asleep, and Azula, as with all things, ruins it.

"What's going on?" he slurs, rubbing his eyes and then lying back down.

"Nothing that concerns – stop it – that concerns you," Azula whispers, quietly enraged. She reaches up and tries to bat him away again. He is a very strong. . . creature, child, whatever he is supposed to be.

"Kids do things like that," Iroh says from the shadows.

Azula grinds her teeth and holds back a scream. "No one asked for your input. And no one ever will for the rest of your pathetic and meaningless life."

"You are right," Iroh replies calmly.

"That's not what you're supposed to say!" Azula snarls, pushing on Ryzu gently. He just readjusts his position pressed against her.

Iroh has the nerve to ask, "If you believe you are wrong, then why would you—?"

"This is beyond pointless," Azula snaps ferociously. "I certainly never chewed on anyone's hair when I was a child. Stop it."

"Children usually _pet_ their mothers' hair. . ." Iroh thinks aloud. "It's similar to that, I think."

" _Similar to that_ ," Azula snarls. "I can safely say that I never pet my mothers' hair."

Iroh makes an infuriating _hmming_ sound.

"Not as safely as you think," he says.

Azula has no words for that.

She does at last find a few.

"Yes, as safely as I think," she says. "I know me and I know my life and – stop it."

"You did," Iroh states.

"No, I didn't," Azula snarls.

"Do you remember every night of your life as a one or two-year-old?" he asks, as if he _cares_.

" _Yes_ ," Azula lies. "Of course I do."

"Alright. I suppose you are an exception, then."

"I hate you," Azula shouts. She cannot take any more of this. She _cannot_.

"He's _agreeing with you_ ," Zuko pipes up from the corner.

"I know. That's why I hate him," Azula growls.

"You hate him for agreeing with you?" Zuko asks.

Azula rolls her eyes.

"I hate him for sarcastically agreeing with—stop it—for sarcastically agreeing with me."

No one says a thing.

"I'm going back to sleep," the Fire Lord at last says.

Zuko turns over with his back to his sister and pulls his blanket over his ears.

 _ **###**_

Azula wakes after a meager amount of sleep to sunbeams on her face and body.

They are beautiful. She seeks their source and sees that the ceiling is in disrepair, letting in the light in staggered cracks in the stone. Her hair is not devoured, but her head hurts and she wonders why she agreed to staying in this place.

Is Ryzu even worth it?

He was intended to be a weapon, and she ought to use him as one.

She just wishes it were not so inexplicably hard to do it.

 _ **###**_

Azula finds the books and scrolls that Iroh brought with him. She hopes they will be helpful when it comes to raising Ryzu. Her son is a handful and – unlike with a human child – no one can give her any decent advice.

He has been trying to fly unsuccessfully for the past two days. Azula has no idea how to teach a baby dragon to fly. That simply was not a lesson at the Academy or in her royal training or in any other institution of education.

"Hey," says a person Azula did not expect to see again. A person who Azula did not _want_ to see again. "I came with the builders because I'm bored."

Azula turns around. Big brown eyes gaze at her. Ty Lee, who married Azula's brother and abandoned her and betrayed her more than once. They will never have a relationship, as much as Azula would love to mock Zuko by stealing his wife.

"You are more than bored," Azula purrs. "How is your hand feeling?"

Ty Lee blinks and smiles in a daze before she remembers what happened with Ryzu. She looks at the small and forgotten scar. It only hurts when she walks on her hands, which she does less and less as she ages.

"Fine. How's Ryzu?" Ty Lee asks, looking around for the baby boy. "Why are you not holding him?"

"Why are you questioning me?" Azula says and Ty Lee flinches faintly. "You may be Fire Lady, but I am the Dragon Mother, and you should fear me more than anything else."

Ty Lee's stomach clenches. Azula has not changed one bit. She _was_ frozen in time as Ty Lee tried to move on. Maybe Ty Lee _did_ move on, but it certainly does not feel like it as she wrings her hands and wishes for smart words to say.

"Where is he, though? I'd love to see him," Ty Lee says, smiling as wide as she can. Azula is not swayed.

"I have allowed my uncle to watch him while I read. He is restless and I am tired," Azula says, stunned by her own honesty. Why would she not lie to Ty Lee? What reason is there for Azula to offer her even a shred of truth, or even a second of her time?

"I'll go see him," Ty Lee chirps. She reluctantly turns away from Azula and prances off to find Iroh and Ryzu.

Azula forces herself not to gaze after her.

 ** _###_**

Ty Lee finds Iroh by the water. The wide river was a smart choice for Sozin when keeping his dragon in lavish lodgings. The Fire Lady imagines that dragons need a _lot_ of water. They are pretty big. Ryzu is still pretty small, but he grows faster than Ty Lee finds comfortable.

He keeps fluttering his wings, but not making much progress.

Iroh watches him as he calmly observes the river. Ty Lee studies him and Ryzu before she gathers the courage to approach.

"Hi. It's so good to see you." Ty Lee hugs Iroh and hesitantly turns to the small dragon.

Ryzu looks up at her.

His eyes are gold. His eyes are gold and they look like Azula's. His eyes are gold like the ones she wants and wants her babies to have.

Ty Lee feels a warmth spreading through her.

She kneels before Ryzu and grins.

"Hi, little guy. Nice to meet you without you biting me."

 ** _###_**

"My room doesn't have a full ceiling," Ty Lee says, walking into Azula's sparsely furnished chamber.

"You cannot stay here," Azula replies. She _does_ sit up, at least, and smooths her hair with her hands. "But you can stay for a moment. Ryzu has finally fallen asleep and I could use—well, I can't say _intelligent_ —company."

Ty Lee smiles. Azula smirks.

"It's a really pretty night," Ty Lee says, gazing at the crescent moon over the indigo river.

"Are we talking about the weather? After all of those years you slowly fell for me," Azula purrs.

Ty Lee knows what it means. Azula fell for her too, but Azula will never say it, and Ty Lee is not brave enough to say it for her.

"What should we talk about, princess, uh, Dragon Mother."

"I am considering Dragon _Queen_ ," Azula suggests. "Do you like it?"

"It's perfect," Ty Lee says, walking towards her doom. The dangerous death that Azula represents has such sweet and warm breath. "I love it, Dragon Queen Azula."

Azula leans forward. She very much likes having someone properly kneel to her. When Ryzu is grown, she will conquer the world, and no one seems to respect that. Save for Ty Lee, the woman Azula can never forgive. Or at least, she thinks she can never forgive.

"I think I know the perfect thing we can talk about," she whispers, smirking. She looks so evil, but Ty Lee cannot bring herself to care. "Exactly nothing."

"What?" Ty Lee asks.

Before she knows it, Azula's lips are against hers.

And. It. Feels. So. Right.

 ** _###_**

Ty Lee screams when she wakes up; something is chewing on her hair.

"Ryzu, stop," Azula orders and the chewing ends. Ryzu releases Ty Lee and taps on Azula's leg with his claws. Azula lifts him up into her arms and looks down at last night's horrid mistake.

"We shouldn't have done that," Ty Lee says, sitting up and standing up and wondering if she should just run. "Right? We shouldn't have, right?"

"Stop saying 'right.'" Azula sets Ryzu down on her bed and rubs her temples. "I think it was what we wanted to do, and I miss being able to do whatever I want to do."

"I do too," Ty Lee says, leaning against the rough stone wall. "Please don't tell Zuko."

"Oh, you only just think of him," Azula remarks. Her smirk transforms into a smug smile. "I suppose I am flattered by that."

"I love him, I think," Ty Lee says, gulping.

"You think? That does not sound so sure," Azula purrs. Her voice is sweet but her words are sour. Ty Lee thinks she is suffocating, even with the wide open windows that let the smooth morning air flood the room. "Admit how much better that was than anything you have done with ZuZu."

Ty Lee plays with her messy hair. She does not know how she can hide the aftermath of sex from the world, and everyone around her is so _moral_ now. Of course they will tell Zuko at the first opportunity. Oh Agni, she is so afraid.

"Azula… Dragon Queen Azula, I will always love you, but I can't love you like—"

"Oh, I don't love you. It's fine," Azula says and Ty Lee's jaw drops. "Why are you startled by that? I don't know how I could love someone who has screwed me over so many times."

"But I didn't mean it," Ty Lee whispers, her lip trembling uncontrollably.

"And I didn't mean last night. I am tired and needed someone, I suppose. Single mothering and all," Azula replies, cracking her knuckles. She could not love Ty Lee's bright red cheeks more. The only thing better is all the moaning. "We both didn't mean it, and so it does not count at cheating."

"I guess," Ty Lee says. She does not think that is true, but she does not want to prolong this conversation.

What is she supposed to do?

 ** _###_**

Azula continues studying the tomes and scrolls. They give extreme details of the care and keeping of dragons, but all of it has been instinctual for her. None of this advice is useful at all. Dragons were separated from their mothers in order to be raised by humans. Fire Nation humans. Azula's ancestors.

They must have taught them to—

Azula hears the fluttering of wings and the scratching of claws.

"You are going to hurt yourself. You are my world and my future and my revenge," Azula says, kneeling in front of her son. He keeps trying, and she has found nothing. "You have to learn to fly."

The moment Azula sets him on her lap, she looks up at the book she opened and sees the article. _Yes_.

Ryzu will fly.


	10. Chapter Nine

Aang stands at a hazy precipice. He does not remember what is around him, and he cannot seem to figure it out. Everything is white save for the very vivid world in front of him. He stares out of an open window, except there is no frame or wall. Just emptiness everywhere, and one look at a city that is familiar.

Ash rains from the sky and the buildings are stained from the fire. His gut twists when he thinks about how he sometimes imagines the end of his entire race. The scrolls he forced himself to read talked about how smoke billowed from all four horizons for months.

This city is not an Air Temple, and not Ba Sing Se, nor Omashu. He realizes it when he sees tattered scraps of fabric.

It is Caldera.

How can the City of Fire burn to ashes?

Before he can finish pondering that thought, he wakes up. His skin _drips_ with sweat, and he sees that the moon has barely risen in the sky. His slumber certainly did not last for very long. He sighs and goes to find a towel and a change of clothes. Maybe just his underwear would suffice for the night; it is hot in the Fire Nation, after all.

When he reaches the edge of his room, he looks out of the open window and stops trying to take off his shirt. It is the view from this window that he saw. Everything looks peaceful now, but he witnesses utter chaos. Aang swallows and closes it, darkening the room. He lights his hand to see his way to the closet.

He tries not to think about his dream until he thinks about Azula's dragon.

Could Ryzu do all of that? One dragon could probably raze a city. One very good firebender might be able to, if no one stopped them.

Could Ryzu do all of that to more than one city?

Aang feels sick.

His sweat feels cold.

 _ **###**_

A few miles outside of the city, Ty Lee cries herself to sleep.

She hates being a victim of love. She hates being in love with someone who does not love her back.

Ty Lee would die a thousand times to make this go away.

All she can think about is the bonfire lit by the tower. The repairs are coming along nicely, and everyone had such a sense of togetherness after the sun set. Ty Lee was among everyone, befriending everyone, feeling less sad.

But once she was alone, she broke down.

She needs people. She needs distractions. She needs to _never_ be alone with her thoughts ever again.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee wakes up and leaves her lonely tent. The morning is so cold and fresh; she feels like sleep had been rebirth. That feeling of positivity begins to waver when she sees Azula nearby. The princess was nowhere to be found last night, her son with her. Ryzu sits on her lap now and Ty Lee sees what has made everyone reluctant to harm her. It is so hard to hurt a mother… if you ever had one, or ever wanted one.

Something tells Ty Lee that Azula would not have that problem.

"Do you worry about motherhood?" Ty Lee asks and Azula stares at her.

"What?" she asks, narrowing her eyes.

"You didn't really have one. Do you think you can be a good one?" Ty Lee says, now afraid. She is very afraid and wishes she had not spoken up. She wonders if she should explain how tired she is and how sorry she is but she keeps quiet.

"Why does that matter to you? I am sure you will be a lovely mother to my brother's children." Azula lifted her hand from the dragon. "Why don't you two have any yet? I have to admit that I am curious."

"We haven't been together really long," Ty Lee says and Azula shakes her head.

"I can tell when you're lying."

"How?"

"Oh, I would never give that away, now would I?" Azula turns to face Ty Lee now. Ryzu makes a small sound, expressing protest, but Azula ignores him. Ty Lee thinks she feels flattered. "Why do you two not have any cute little princes and princesses?"

"I don't know," Ty Lee says. _Because we've never been good at sex,_ she would say if she were an honest person anymore. Or ever. Ty Lee cannot remember a time when lies were not second nature.

"I hope you two have a big family," Azula says. Her voice burns like fire and lingers like poison. Ty Lee wishes being around Princess Azula did not hurt so much.

"Do you want me to help you teach Ryzu flying?" Ty Lee asks, smiling hopefully, and Azula scoffs. It makes Ty Lee feel like a cave hopper. Smaller and more pathetic than that, actually. The princess has many powers, and destroying a person with a single look is one of them.

"What would you know about that? You cannot even tie your own shoes, much less teach a dragon how to fly," Azula says, standing up. "I will be by the river."

"Why are you telling me that?" Ty Lee asks. She wants to run away, but she stays for some reason. "I thought you didn't want my help."

"I did not say I didn't want your… company." Azula does not say that in a very welcoming fashion. "Goodbye."

Ty Lee waves as Azula and Ryzu walk away.

 _ **###**_

Azula stays away from the construction. Manual labor and menial tasks do not suit a princess. Other people build her new home; she just lives in it once it is flawless.

She has set a slightly-charred but somehow-intact stuffed tiger-monkey atop a tree branch. Ryzu wants it; his eyes beg and beg. Azula leans back and waits for him to fly.

The mother and son have not gotten very far when Ty Lee arrives.

"I brought snacks!" she says, holding up her excuse to visit.

Azula knew Ty Lee would show up. The Fire Lady always seems to wind up with the princess.

"I am occupied with teaching Ryzu to fly," Azula says as Ty Lee sets down the basket. "I do not have time to pretend you're more than a pretty face and make you feel like you have worth."

"I'm so sick of people saying that kind of stuff to me," Ty Lee snaps. "I'm not shallow or self-absorbed or obsessed with my own looks."

"If I stuck a mirror to the bottom of a pond you would drown," Azula says, her lips twitching. Is it a new or particularly funny joke? No. Does it elicit a very pleasing angry reaction from Ty Lee? Yes. Azula is content with it.

"And I don't need you to tell me what I'm worth," Ty Lee adds. Her _ears_ are red, redder than her cheeks. Azula loves this. She has the power again and it feels good.

Once Ryzu grows up, Azula will be able to finish her ascent. Talking to Ty Lee feels like a taste of what ruling the world would be like.

"Well, yes, I am certain you found someone else to do that in my absence." Azula smirks.

Ty Lee opens the basket. Ryzu moves towards it but Azula reaches it first. She smashes down the lid right on Ty Lee's hands, but pays her wail no mind.

Azula says sternly, "You will eat when you fly."

Ryzu glares at her. Ty Lee laughs while rubbing her hurt hand.

Azula pouts at her disappointing son. He _needs_ to fly.

"Ty Lee, you're clearly a whore, give me some advice," the princess says, trying to make this less _boring_.

The comment does not give Ty Lee time to be insulted.

"Uh… uh-huh?" she replies, dumbstruck.

Azula asks nonchalantly, "Do you think if I seduced a man, I would have another… another, or would it be a human?"

Ty Lee does not even try to think about it before she answers, "I think that's a question for smart people not… whores."

Azula rolls her eyes. Predictable, but still annoying. "Apparently you are neither. Fine, from your chaste and idiotic perspective, what do you think would happen?"

"I don't even know what happened to make Ryzu. That's not supposed to be possible." Ty Lee eyes the basket of food and wonders if she should make another dive for it.

"But it happened. Therefore, it is possible," Azula says, sitting down on top of the basket.

"Are we possible?" Ty Lee whispers, forgetting her throbbing hand for the first time in minutes.

Azula knows what she means, but she does not want to ever have this conversation. Her feelings bother her enough without her _discussing_ them.

"No. Because we never happened." Azula gets up to leave, gesturing for Ryzu to follow.

Ty Lee stops her by saying, "We did happen. I thought we did, at least."

"It wasn't real, and you made sure of that." Bitterness, resentment, hatred. Azula feels all of that and Ty Lee does not know if she can fix it.

"I didn't want to hurt you," she says, as she has said so many times before. Azula will never forget the Boiling Rock and Ty Lee should accept it.

"But you did," Azula says, as she has said so many times before. "You destroyed me and I see how much it _tortures_ you even after all of this time. You look at me in a way that is just _so_ satisfying. You are so pretty when you're guilty."

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee has to ask. She cannot help it. She _has_ to ask.

She finds Azula inside of the tower. The moon is high in the sky and the stars sparkle and shine. The fires outside burn, and Ty Lee realizes Azula is a flame. But Azula is not the kind that offers warmth or light or food; she is the kind that burns villages to the ground.

Ty Lee is a moth. A moth that is drawn solely to wildfires.

"Are you thinking about… trying to make… another?" she asks, flushing bright red and feeling foolish.

"No," Azula says. It is always so unclear if she is lying or not. "I have concerns about my birthright."

"And that's why you were asking about me and Zuko. Because if we can't have a baby, that makes yours next in line for the crown, and yours isn't even human."

Ty Lee's intellect stuns Azula, but not as much as it would anyone else. Azula has always known that Ty Lee is not as dumb as she plays herself out to be. The princess will _never_ divulge that observation, even under torture.

It would be partially admitting that she sees Ty Lee in a truly positive light.

It would be partially admitting that they see each other in ways that nobody else can.

It would be partially admitting that they were in love once.

"Maybe." Azula shrugs. She sighs. "You're right. I find that I want to rule the Fire Nation, no matter what other role the Universe throws at me."

"I thought you'd rather be a Dragon Mother than a Fire Lord," Ty Lee says, sitting down in front of Azula without invitation. It irks the princess.

"I want to be both," Azula says, staring at the flames. "But I know that I can't have it all. No one can. Not even the beautiful and happy Fire Lady. What is it that you're _missing_?"

Ty Lee shakes her head.

"Nothing. I'm really this happy. My life is great," she says through a smile.

Azula sees what that means.

Ty Lee isn't missing something in her life; her life is missing Ty Lee.

It must hurt.

Azula should feel better about that than she does.

 _ **###**_

Azula is not always happy about it, but she was recalled to life for a reason.

Waking in that open grave was one of the worst experiences she had ever endured. She saw the world above her and clawed her way to it for some reason. It would have been easier to lay down and die, but she simply could not.

Now she is at last entering her new home that she will share with a true monster of a son. Ryzu is hers and Ryzu has turned her world upside down.

Whatever reason there is, Azula will pursue it.

The workers completed construction, and now Azula walks across the grass to the front of the tower. She cannot figure out how they got it into such good shape after so many years of wear and tear.

Despite her acceptance of Ryzu, when she opens the door of the refurbished dragon prison, she wishes she had never been resurrected or went through the horrors of the Spirit World. Her life is about to become much worse and much more complicated and Azula is not ready yet.

She is _insane_ , to tell the truth. She is _broken_ , to be honest. She is incapable of caring for a baby dragon on her own in captivity.

"I don't know about this," Azula whispers as she forces herself to step inside. It smells better than it used to, and the rooms look habitable, but that does not make the chilly air and bars on the windows feel any less daunting.

"You don't have a choice," says Uncle. Azula despises him for voicing the truth; he has no right to intrude upon her new life. "I'm sorry."

"No, you are not sorry. You have never liked me and I have never liked you. We should accept that," firmly says Azula, walking towards the stairs. The room up there would have to fit Ryzu once he is fully grown, which will be a difficult task.

Iroh says nothing, which Azula takes as acceptance of her accusations. He gestures ahead and she walks into the heart of her new home.

Is she letting this happen to her? She has a _dragon_ and she is letting her brother have her locked up forever? Is she honestly going to raise Ryzu in a cage?

Yes. Azula hates to face the facts, but the answer to every one of those questions is yes.

For now _yes_ is her response, but she will not resign herself eternally. She will have her revenge one day.

Her imprisonment is temporary, as she tries to remind herself.

 ** _###_**

Ty Lee rarely has strange dreams. Hers are quite boring, but last night she had a very vivid nightmare that lingers with her like strong perfume on old clothes.

It began with Azula and Ryzu in a field. Ty Lee stood on the edge of the grass, blending into the tree line as she watched them. As Ryzu flew, he grew and grew into a formidable monster. Azula did not seem to fear him, but Ty Lee did.

The tranquil meadow went up in intense flames.

Ryzu rose higher and Azula lay against the fire, shimmering like sunlight underwater. The sky turned black and ash rained from the sky. Ty Lee felt her lungs constrict, but there was nothing she could do. Azula glowed brighter yet until she was the sun itself, and maybe all of the stars too.

Ty Lee woke just as the fire began to consume her helpless body.

 ** _###_**

That afternoon, Ryzu finally flies.

He flutters up through the air and then plummets, excitement in his golden eyes and then pain as he hits the stone floor. The princess lunges out to try to help him, a motion that would have been alien to her in the distant past. Becoming a mother has… changed things. Changed reflexes. Changed thoughts. She wonders why upon occasion, but does not linger on it.

Azula has been sitting in Ryzu's room for hours, trying to help him figure out his azure wings. The wide windows are barred but humongous. They allow in cold air and copious sunlight, which gives Azula some small comfort. Ryzu is as close to outside as Zuko will allow.

Until Azula overthrows Zuko, of course, with the help of her beautiful son.

Her beautiful son who has at last begun to fly. It brings tears to her eyes.

"You're wonderful. Good job," Azula gushes. "That was perfect and please do it again."

From behind Azula, Ty Lee says kindly, "You're really sweet. You're a good mom and I love you and love it and stuff."

Azula's expression sours. She grinds her teeth and stands up, stepping away from her son and towards her traitorous ex-girlfriend.

"You have ruined this glorious moment, as you ruin all things in my life. I would appreciate it if you would just go home to my brother's bedroom and let me be," Azula says frigidly, gently stroking her son's face. He chirps and she smiles at him, pointedly ignoring Ty Lee.

Despite Azula's cold shoulder, Ty Lee watches the eerie scene, unable to forget the nightmare that has been burned in her mind. She feels envious of Azula and Ryzu. All Ty Lee ever wanted was to be a parent… of Azula's child. That will never happen and that breaks the heart of the acrobat.

"Can I help with him at all?" Ty Lee asks and Azula shakes her head. Ty Lee looks crestfallen, but collects herself before Azula can judge her.

"You should go home. I am surrendering to my new life with honor and dignity," Azula orders, tapping into her princess powers.

Ty Lee sighs.

"I don't want to go home," she gently says, reaching to touch Azula but recoiling before she can. The princess would not accept that warm touch.

"I want you to leave, and this is my decision, unless you want to camp out on my new lawn. Oh, perhaps Zuko will allow you to deliver my meals and make sure I stay locked in." Azula knows Ty Lee will never do that, but she can pretend.

"You understand why he's scared, right?" Ty Lee inquires.

"Oh, I do, and he absolutely should be, but that does not make me any happier about this."

"That makes sense, I guess." Ty Lee rubs her elbow and tries not to make eye contact. "Azula, I'm sorry that they're doing this to you."

Azula shrugs.

"I didn't expect anything less. I'm going to be a prisoner for the rest of my life," says Azula, sitting down on the floor. She rubs her knee and tries not to look at Ty Lee.

Princess Azula will not let this happen to her. When Ryzu is grown, she will have the revenge she so desperately craves.

But for now, he can barely fly, much less turn the world to ashes. She has to play along with her brother and hide in this tower until her time comes.

Revenge takes patience.

That is simply a fact of the Universe.

"I'll see you," Ty Lee says.

It is a lie.

Ty Lee never returns to the tower after today.

* * *

One year later, Azula wakes on a cold and sunny morning.

She had another dream about the world on fire, burning, blackened. They might mean something, but she does not care much.

Azula sits up and walks up the stairs to her son. Ryzu is old enough to light the world up like a tinderbox on a dry day. Her revenge never happened. She has been placated by time and this tower.

When she reaches the top floor, he stretches his wings. She watches him and her mind drifts away to the fantasies she once had. He is old enough now… but she is too old now, perhaps.

Azula spins around when she hears someone burst in downstairs. Her keepers tend to knock first, in order to avoid being _roasted_ by Ryzu.

"AZULA!" screams Zuko, the last person Azula ever expected to speak to today. "AZULA!"

"I am coming," she mutters, well aware that he cannot hear her. She turns to her son. "Wait here; I'm sure he brought food."

Azula skitters down the windy stone stairs. Zuko makes some dreadful noise and she quickens her pace. When she reaches him, he grabs her by the shoulders. She seizes him arm and shoves him off of her.

"Calm down. It can't be that much of an emergency," Azula snarls, stepping backwards until she is out of his reach.

He takes a deep breath and rubs his temples.

"You know the spirit attacks haven't stopped, right?" he asks and the princess nods. She does not care much about the outside world now, but she knows about it. "There's been a horrible one."

"Why does that concern me? No one seems to acknowledge my existence; why should I mind if they exist or not?" Azula demands, crossing her arms. Zuko shakes his head.

"The spirit was a dragon."

"You still don't seem to understand. You can all burn to death." Azula turns around and begins to walk back up to Ryzu.

After two steps, she suddenly falls down the stairs, hits her head, and blacks out.

 _"_ _It's time," says a familiar voice. Azula cannot place it until she looks up; above her is the spirit who held her captive and trained her for two years._

 _"_ _How did I stay alive?" Azula mouths, reaching up._

 _The shadows around her race like a rushing river. It overwhelms her eyes and she begins to feel like she is falling._

 _"_ _It's time. You've waited too long," again repeats the spirit._

 _Azula tries to sit up and struggles, paralyzed._

 _She at last gets to her feet…_

and Zuko grabs her elbow.

"You hit your head. Are you okay?" he asks, like he cares. Azula jabs him with the point of her elbow and steps away again.

"I just slipped," she says softly. She does not know what _'It's time'_ even means, but she does not like it. "Now tell me about this spirit attack."

Azula hears Ryzu make an impatient noise.

This has all become too confusing for her to bear.

* * *

Six months later, "She wouldn't trust me. She wouldn't trust me in a million years, Zuko," Ty Lee says sharply, crossing her arms. If the idea of what he has just suggested is not bad enough, it also sucks. "She'll know something's wrong in an instant."

Ty Lee and her husband stand in the woods outside of Caldera. They have narrowly escaped Azula and her army of _dragons_. Dragons. Azula and Mai are in the palace, and Ty Lee is somehow supposed to infiltrate it.

"Maybe she won't trust you, but I don't think she'll turn you down. You're persuasive," Zuko says earnestly and Ty Lee _does_ know that this horrible, ill-thought out plan is way better than waiting to be dragged out of the forest and eaten.

Ty Lee gulps and again looks at the nearly sheer dress pressed against her tan skin.

"Maybe she'll want to sleep with me, or maybe she'll see through it because she's the smartest person I've ever met," Ty Lee says. She knows this is the only way, despite her protests. "I'll go there, but I really don't know if I'll come back."

"We're going to get found at some point," Zuko says, rubbing his dirty face. "It's better to take some initiative than to just… give up. Please don't give up."

"I haven't talked to her in almost two years," Ty Lee whispers. "I don't know what I'd say."

"Please do this. Please," Zuko begs, and Ty Lee cannot deny him.

Perhaps there is no romantic love between them, but he is her best friend, like Azula once was, a long, long time ago.

"I'll…" Ty Lee just nods.

She leans forward and swiftly kisses him on the cheek before running into the woods, towards the outpost where she intends to turn herself in.

This better go well.


	11. Chapter Ten

Ty Lee does not know how her surrender will turn out. Zuko's plan makes some sense, even though it comes from a place of desperation. Right now, she sits, handcuffed, after turning herself in. She hears murmurs among the soldiers planning on bringing her through the superfluously guarded borders of Caldera, Dragon Queen Azula's Fortress City.

Even from the room with the small, barred window, she sees the smoke rising from the city where she was born. It never has stopped since Azula stormed Caldera with an army. An army of dragons that could not be stopped.

Aang entered the Spirit World that day, trying to stop the strong spirits supporting Princess Azula. He never returned. Now, Ty Lee knows she must play the part handed to her; she must bring down Azula from the inside.

She looks at the wanted poster on the table just outside of her cell. It is pretty flattering; she is happy to see. There is one plus side in this horrible experience.

A muscly guy walks in. "We sent a messenger-hawk to Dragon Queen Azula. She has requested your immediate presence in the palace."

Ty Lee feels her blood begin to rush, leaving her light-headed. She never thought she would have to face Azula again, have to admit their love, have to look her in the eyes and conquer her again.

She closes her eyes and tries to remember why she has to do this.

 _ **###**_

When she enters, surrounded by a thick guard and with her wrists and ankles shackled, she sees the city around her. It is the same but different. Mostly different. She cannot recognize it after the Dragon Queen rose to power and painted it with ash and a new kind of propaganda posters.

The people look trapped between happiness and misery, and Ty Lee does not know which side of the spectrum any peasant or noble or other citizens falls upon.

At the front of the palace, they search her for weapons. Now, she expected that, and so she does not have any on her person.

Mai walks into the room and says, "She doesn't _need_ weapons, morons."

Ty Lee cannot help but smile. Maybe Mai did side with Azula in the end, but Ty Lee will always be her very best friend in this world. She is happy to see her, happy to see her intact and well-dressed and without her head on a stake.

"It's been forever!" Ty Lee calls out, smiling brightly despite her circumstances.

Mai does not respond; she seems at a loss for words. Ty Lee has a thousand things to say but she keeps them to herself for now.

 _ **###**_

"I want to see Azula," Ty Lee insists as they lock her in a room. It might be nicer than the average pit or prison, but she cannot bear the idea of sleeping here without laying eyes on her lost love. "I _want_ to and you will _let_ me see her."

The guard in charge laughs at the notion.

"She'll see you whenever she wants to. Right now she happens to be dealing with important matters of war and has little time for a tea party with you," the guard firmly says.

Ty Lee pouts and lets him finish locking her inside. If Azula wants to keep her here, Azula will keep her here. The Dragon Queen does always get what she wants. At least it is better than being fed to Ryzu, a fate that several prisoners of war have met, assuming the rumors are true.

This palace has not changed. Ty Lee supposes the throne room must burn blue instead of orange, and perhaps Azula has redecorated with some dragon memorabilia to fit her name. Other than that, it might as well be the same place Ty Lee grew up in.

They were so close for so many years. Ty Lee _loved_ her and now she feels crushed by what Azula has become.

No, not what she has become. This is what Azula always was and Ty Lee must face that fact. She might have fallen in love with someone who does not exist.

Ty Lee sits down for an undetermined period of time—but before sunset—until the door unlocks. She perks up, expecting Azula, but it is Mai.

"Oh, uh, hi." Ty Lee waves and tries to smile.

"I know I'm not who you're looking for. I've never been," Mai says, shutting the door behind her and leaning against it. "You two were destined to be or something. Ugh. I feel gross just saying that." She shudders. "Why did you turn yourself in?"

"I want to talk to Azula," Ty Lee snaps. She then sighs and softly apologizes for her outburst.

"Azula wants me to see you first. She says she doesn't want to waste her time, which I take as her fearing rejection," Mai dryly replies. "Now why did you turn yourself in?"

Ty Lee stares at the floor as she thinks about her answer. "I couldn't run forever. I figured that I'd be safer turning myself in than getting caught."

"And Zuko…?" Mai asks, waving her hand for Ty Lee to continue.

"He was too stubborn to do it with me. I tried to convince him, but we both know Azula would've killed him in a snap of her fingers," Ty Lee says, wondering when she learned how to lie. She thinks she might be good at it, because Mai appears to believe her.

Mai shrugs. "I believe you, but Azula is the person who sees through lies."

"Can you tell me if there are any other prisoners? Anyone I…?" Ty Lee asks, not needing to say the last part: _I might know_.

"I probably shouldn't, but I will. The assault on Caldera last year mostly ended in rescues by the rebel forces. Not everyone got saved. They're friends of yours, although, friends of yours is pretty broad," Mai says, averting her eyes. She knows it will bother Ty Lee, and, while she renounced Ty Lee in Azula's favor, she still considers her to be a dear friend.

Ty Lee's breath catches. She knew the battle did not end in the favor of those fighting for justice, but she never put much thought into it except for occasionally waking in her campsite and staring up at the stars as she wonders if her friends are at all okay.

At least Mai is.

Mai uncrosses her arms for the first time and adjusts her silk robes. Ty Lee's eyes widen.

Before Ty Lee can dare ask, Mai answers a different question.

"If you're planning on seducing Azula and then assassinating her or something, you should know that she's engaged." Mai sees Ty Lee's crestfallen expression—one that Ty Lee did not need to fake—and wonders what to do about it. Mai goes with the lazy choice of 'nothing.'

"Engaged to who?" Ty Lee demands. The pressure of tears builds under her eyes.

"To me," Mai replies.

The young woman who might be pregnant and probably is marrying Azula leaves Ty Lee in her bedroom alone.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee wakes from a fitful sleep when the door opens. She jumps up, clenching her fists, but releases them when she sees the Dragon Queen. It pains Ty Lee to admit it, but Azula has never looked more beautiful. Beautiful, though.

In the past, when Ty Lee was head over heels, she would only ever call her _radiant_.

She is just beautiful now. A far colder word.

"Congratulations," Ty Lee says. Azula cocks an eyebrow. "About your engagement and about finally conquering the world like you always wanted to and… stuff."

"How kind of you to say," Azula replies, her voice as slick and cold as black ice on the dirt roads of Kyoshi Island. She does not look very happy to see Ty Lee. "Do you feel anything like I did when I woke up and found out you married my brother."

"I married him because I didn't have you," Ty Lee says, hoping she is lying for the sake of her mission. Truly. She cannot imagine harboring any _real_ feelings for a woman who burned down the world.

"I am not doing this out of desire to conquer like my father or his father or his father. The spirits gave me a mission and I fulfilled it. They were angry and I was their only vessel," Azula coolly explains. "Of course, I do enjoy ruling the world. It suits me."

"And Mai?" Ty Lee deliberately redirects attention to Mai this time. She knows if she proves that she is hung up on Azula, Azula will be more likely to eventually trust her.

"Mai occupied my time, and now I'm slightly devoted to her," Azula explains, beginning to pace as she speaks. "There's no point in ruling the world alone, Ty Lee. You were my first choice the last time I had this opportunity. She is my first choice this time around. And you blew it for yourself on both of those occasions."

Ty Lee forces her visceral reaction out of her mind and focuses her attention on the woman in front of her. Azula has gone from a hollow shell of herself cradling a baby—a baby dragon, at least—in her arms, to a true, formidable empress.

Maybe ruling the world does suit her.

"Is she pregnant?" Ty Lee asks, stopping Azula in her tracks. "I only ask…"

"Yes, but she didn't cheat on me," Azula says, picking up on the insinuation. "Of course, you will now remind me of the obvious that two women can't have a baby and _no_ they can't, but when the spirits make demands I listen."

"You follow their orders," Ty Lee whispers, her eyes wide. She cannot believe it.

"I owe them my crown and my beautiful son. They have been kind to me, and in return I am kind to them. It has nothing to do with _obedience_ ," says Azula. Ty Lee wonders how many times the Dragon Queen has been through that speech in her head. "If the spirits ask anything of you, not that they would, you will obey. I heed their counsel; you follow their orders. And mine, of course."

Ty Lee feels the pressure of tears again. She holds them back; Azula cannot see her look so weak.

"You won't kill me, right?" Ty Lee whispers. Azula nods, seeming genuine about it.

Ty Lee knows deep down that Azula could never kill her. Maybe, she sometimes has contemplated, in a fit of rage. Never something calculated. Ty Lee _knows_ that Azula loves her.

"I understand your motivations. They are selfish, and at is the only kind I trust," Azula replies. She hesitates and turns around. "Not that I trust you. I will never trust you, no matter how much you bow and scrape."

Ty Lee nods. She has decided that when Azula says 'jump' she will say 'how high' until further notice. If she must walk on eggshells, she must. If she must walk on hot coals, she must.

"How's Ryzu?" Ty Lee asks, absentmindedly stroking the scar she still has on her hand.

Azula notices it, but keeps the observation to herself.

"He is in the tower at the top of the palace. I did some… remodeling and gave the highest floors to him as a roost." Azula's expression changes, the brutal Dragon Queen becoming a mother. "He grew up so fast, but he still loves his mother. I'm proud of him."

"That's good," Ty Lee says, offering a toothy smile so forceful that it squeezes her eyes shut.

"My little Ryzu conquered the world and I could not be more proud." Azula hesitates. "I think I would be even if he didn't. I don't know how any parent could be truly dissatisfied with their child."

She speaks of Ozai, but Ty Lee, of course, does not point it out.

Ty Lee needs to remain in Azula's good graces.

"You can come see Ryzu tomorrow," says Azula.

Ty Lee takes one step too far, wondering if she can push it. She begins to kiss Azula on the lips, but the Dragon Queen pulls away.

"What part of _engaged_ do you not understand?" snarls a woman who takes what she wants when she wants.

Which means…

Which means she doesn't want Ty Lee.

* * *

 _ **AN:**_ _I love love triangles. There will be one haha. I initially wanted a Ty Luko/Tyzula triangle, but that's becoming kind of overused, so I decided on a Maizula/Tyzula triangle._


	12. Chapter Eleven

Ty Lee does not sleep well. She smells the smoke even with her window closed and she hears the wails of spirits policing the streets.

"I recruited humans to help out with the curfew patrols," a voice says, making Ty Lee sit up and scream. "You have lost some of your situational awareness; I imagine you didn't hear me coming in because of the spirits outside."

Ty Lee sits up. She sees little but a silhouette and glittering golden eyes. The sight is frightening and intoxicating both.

"You got humans to do it?" Ty Lee whispers, wide-eyed.

Azula nods.

"It was a good offer for them. I have a lot of loyal soldiers, of course, what with three armies behind me, but I asked civilians to police other civilians. At the time, I imagined it would comfort the dissidents. Of course, insurgents never think logically, now do they?" Azula walks to stand in front of the window. The moonlight illuminates her, but it does not make her less scary; it does the opposite.

Ty Lee picks at her lips as she thinks. Azula waits patiently for Ty Lee to speak first, which is not something that has ever happened in their relationship. Does any relationship still exist between them? Yes. Captor and captive.

"It's hard to sleep here. It's really different," Ty Lee softly explains, even though she knows that could go unsaid. "I'm super grateful, of course, because this is way nicer than a jail but—"

"You knew I would keep you here. Do not take me for such a fool," Azula says, sitting down on the windowsill. "You came running to me because you wanted the Dragon Queen's attention and favor. Did it get boring being a nobody hiding in the woods? Did you lack the attention you always have desperately craved?"

Ty Lee feels infinitesimally small. Azula has a knack for doing that to people.

"It's good to be with you and Mai," Ty Lee says. She thinks she might mean it, and so Azula does not lash out over the questionable claim. "Before the Boi-betrayal. Before that awful betrayal, you two were the only people in the world who _really_ mattered to me."

"She just mattered more." Azula pretends not to care, shrugging but not concealing her expression well enough. "So, you can understand that she now matters more to me than you do."

It makes Ty Lee's blood boil for no good reason. She has no reason to feel jealous when she is married to Zuko.

"I…guess I understand," says Ty Lee, toying with her blankets.

"You never visited me before," Azula comments. Ty Lee does not know what she means by it. "I was locked up in that tower with only me and Ryzu and you never stopped by once."

Ty Lee hangs her head. She _does_ feel guilty about that for good reason.

"I'm sorry," Ty Lee says.

"Have a nice night. I hope you sleep well," Azula says offhandedly before exiting the room and locking the door behind her.

Ty Lee sits up and stares at the closed door for a long time.

She wonders why Azula bothered to stop by for just a few moments. There must have been some reason for it, but Ty Lee cannot guess what for the life of her.

 _ **###**_

In the morning, guards take Ty Lee out to the courtyards. It is cold out, but the air is surprising crisp and damp for how smoky the city of Caldera is. Ty Lee walks around and examines how things have changed. Flowers and plants still bloom despite the raging fires. The former Fire Lady bends down to pluck one, but a guard grabs her arm.

"It makes the spirits angry. They're trying to rebuild nature," he says.

Ty Lee nods, although she wonders why the spirits think burning things left and right and killing people will restore nature. Restoring the dragons is one thing; resurrecting flowers is another. The latter seems pettier than the former.

"I wouldn't want to make them angry," Ty Lee says, straightening her back and stretching.

She wanders for a while longer, eyes on her at all times, and then turns around to see Mai sitting at one of the tables with tea in hand. Mai hates the outdoors, so Ty Lee thinks her old friend probably came looking for her. Ty Lee walks across the courtyard and sits down across from Mai.

Ty Lee notices the baby bump now. It is quite distinct in Mai's clothes today, but she still does not look exceptionally far in.

"Are you acclimating?" Mai asks, sounding bored by her own question.

"Sorta," Ty Lee says, nodding more fervently than she should. "I hope I can."

Mai lackadaisically murmurs a favorable response. She raises her voice to an audible volume when she says, "Azula will want to play with you, and I don't mean in a sexual way. You surrendered yourself into a dollhouse."

Ty Lee does know that but she wonders if it is wise to say it out loud.

"I had to. I couldn't run forever and I didn't _want_ to," Ty Lee says. "I thought maybe she had some affection left for me and that I could be okay here, that maybe she wouldn't execute me."

"Oh, she won't. She would never get rid of you so quickly, not until she gets bored of you," Mai says gravely. Ty Lee wonders…

"Do you love Azula?" Ty Lee asks.

"We don't love each other. Azula and I don't love; I don't think we're capable of it. I was—and am—her advisor. I was strictly her advisor but I was too good at what I did. The spirits took interest in me and I became engaged to her over it," Mai explains. Ty Lee believes her. "I guess we're supposed to be some kind of happy family, but I don't do happy and Azula doesn't do family."

Ty Lee closes her eyes.

"Good luck with your… everything with her."

Ty Lee has never felt such jealousy, nor such loathing towards herself.

 ** _###_**

Ty Lee meets Ryzu that day. He towers above her, so different from the baby who bit her.

It hurts much more when the adult does. When she tries to approach the dragon, he lashes out with his claws, as if he has hungered for her blood since that day. She screams at the gash and is stunned at who runs for her.

The Dragon Queen's crown tips and falls as she stares down at Ty Lee. She examines the gash, her chest heaving, before Ty Lee blacks out from the pain.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee wakes up to the sensation of drifting aimlessly. Her head feels fuzzy and she registers slight discomfort at her midsection. She tries to sit up when she remembers that Ryzu attacked her, but the pain returns her to her back. Ty Lee squeezes her eyes shut until the pain recedes again.

She looks up and sees the Dragon Queen.

"Oh, good, you're up," says Azula. Ty Lee struggles to comprehend her words.

"Whaddidayougiveme…?" Ty Lee slurs.

"A dragon scratch hurts a little more than a cat scratch. If you would like me to stop giving you the pain herbs, I certainly can," purrs Azula, sounding slightly offended. Ty Lee does not know why. Maybe she would be able to read Azula if she did not feel so wonky.

"Ilike 'em," slurs Ty Lee, uncertain where her ability to speak went.

She looks up towards Dragon Queen Azula and first sees a figure radiating sunlight. The room has a golden tint from the time of day and Azula looks like the Empress of the Sun, not the Mother of Dragons. Azula walks to Ty Lee and transforms from an embodiment of the sun into an ordinary person.

Ty Lee thinks for a moment why her feelings for Azula and feelings for sunshine are quite different. Azula might as well be the sun, but she is the sun in a scorching desert, cruel, relentless, pleased to have such power. Sunshine is equated with happiness in places not as arid and dangerous as those haunted by the strong sun.

Azula used to make her happy, but… she always was afraid of Azula. Mai apparently was not, but Ty Lee is not Mai. Ty Lee then notices how much she _wishes_ she were Mai, with her baby and her potential family with Azula. If that were to belong to anyone, it _should_ belong to Ty Lee.

"Mai hurts you, doesn't she?" asks Azula and Ty Lee's eyes widen. "What; you look like you just saw a ghost?"

Ty Lee shakes her head. "I juss thaw for a minuhju could read minds."

"Oh, but I can," Azula says, smirking as she sits on the foot of the bed, twisting her body to face the pained, bedridden girl of her long-lost dreams. "Still, it is not different from you and Zuko. I also know that you are still loyal to him, and he probably is the one who sent you here."

Ty Lee's eyes are wide, her mouth agape, her fingers suddenly clutching the blankets. Azula remains poised and statuesque as Ty Lee panics.

"How didju know?" Ty Lee asks, trying to sit up again.

Azula touches her shoulder and gently pushes her back down. "Stop; you will hurt yourself. Now, I knew from the moment you walked into Caldera that you were on some secret mission. That aside, I _could_ tell you what I am going to do with you, but I don't want to. It would be so boring that way, don't you think?"

Ty Lee does not think she has ever been this scared before. She decides to make a desperate grab for the preservation of her life.

"I- _I_ had more, more, uh, more…" Ty Lee hopes Azula understands that. The Dragon Queen says nothing, so maybe Ty Lee has a chance. "I did wanna seeoo."

"Unsurprising." Azula does not look as shocked as Ty Lee hoped she would.

"I'm sorry I didn't visit." Ty Lee must force every word out, but she manages to articulate. She wants to be able to say it properly.

Azula takes a slow breath, gazing at Ty Lee with pity.

"I believe the phrase would be 'too little, too late,'" says the Dragon Queen, rolling her shoulders. "Oh, don't look so wounded. You put _yourself_ in this position."

Azula stands up and leaves Ty Lee scared and alone.

 ** _###_**

 _Ember Island, years before the Dragon Queen conquered the world._

 _Ty Lee reaches across the salt and sand. The setting sun frames Azula with a darkness and color that mirrors her aura. Feeling so funny, she takes Azula's hand in hers. Azula allows it, which is the most exciting thing Ty Lee has ever felt._

 _She is on a beautiful beach, she is young, she is alive, and she is in love. That is all a person can ever ask to be. That is the_ best _thing to be._

 _"_ _You look really pretty in sunrise, but you look just as pretty in sunset," Ty Lee says, wanting to stroke Azula's wrist but too afraid to do it. So much for that confidence she attempted to teach Azula last night. Maybe she is good at flirting, but she is good at it because she has nothing to lose with the stream of potential lovers she does not accept._

 _"_ _I always look pretty," Azula says. Ty Lee vigorously nods._

 _"_ _Yes. I have something I really want to say but I don't know any of the words to say it," Ty Lee says, her body feeling like she is walking a tightrope. This is more jarring, dangerous and frightening than acrobatics ever could be._

 _"_ _Go ahead." Azula does not seem to care, which hurts Ty Lee._

 _"_ _I'd—uh—well—I'd—you see—I'd rather you kill me than not love me," Ty Lee blurts out. She wants to dig a deep hole in the sand and curl up in it to die._

 _"_ _I get that a lot," says Azula, shrugging._

 _Ty Lee cannot tell if she is lying—joking—or not. She just knows that people want Azula to love them. Zuko and Mai are probably the only people immune to that._

 _"_ _But—but—uh—but—I mean that in a romantic way," Ty Lee whispers. Yes, dying buried in the sand sounds very pleasant right now._

 _Azula does look surprised at last. She stares at Ty Lee and starts to lean towards her before pulling back. At first, she does not release Ty Lee's hand, but the moment her palms begin to sweat she slips away._

 _"_ _I—oh—I—oh—well—I…" Azula is tongue-tied. "That's a thing you said, I guess."_

 _It is pretty far from her most eloquent, but Ty Lee is relieved._

 _The nervous, socially inept person sitting beside her is better than the cold, disinterested dream girl sitting within lips' reach._

 ** _###_**

"Will you take me outside?" Ty Lee asks one of the healers taking care of her. "It's such a beautiful day and I've been in this bed _forever_."

Ty Lee bats her eyelashes and smiles. It works, as it always does.

With the healer's help, she is able to get out again. The courtyard is a bit close to Ryzu, and she does not want to get half-eaten again, but she wants to see it. Whatever the spirits have done with the place she is deeply attracted to.

She has never seen such lush foliage in her life.

Ty Lee looks up and sees a familiar tree. She wonders if the branch she dangled upside down from over and over is still there. It probably is not, just like everything else she fondly recalls from childhood.

As she, with the assistance of crutches, explores, she finds a stream that did not exist before. It flows in a way that calms even a girl from the Fire Nation. Up ahead is a small waterfall, and Ty Lee wonders where it stems from. It does not seem to be manmade.

How strange.

"Do you see why they have the right idea?" Azula says.

Ty Lee jumps, so startled that she barely catches herself and her crutches. She hops around to look at the Dragon Queen.

"The spirits, you mean?" Ty Lee asks curiously and Azula nods.

"They just wanted to fix what my ancestors did to the world. They needed someone to _truly_ heal things. Of course, I think I am supposed to be working together with the Avatar. Unfortunately, no one seems to be able to find him and I think he might object to my highly effective methods," says Azula, walking closer to Ty Lee.

Ty Lee smiles at her.

"I was telling the truth about wanting to see you. But, no, I'm not here for any reasons you want," Ty Lee says.

Azula shrugs. "I expected it. You never were the girl I thought you to be."

"What does that mean?" Ty Lee asks, now afraid Azula will strike her down without a second thought. She might feed Ty Lee to Ryzu, which sounds like an unpleasant way to die.

"It means that I imagined you were much more desirable than you are. I thought you were loyal and worth my attention," Azula coolly says, eyeing Ty Lee with pure disdain. It hurts the former Fire Lady. "I was young, I suppose."

"We both were," Ty Lee replies quietly, giving in to the animosity. Well, _pretending_ to succumb to loathing, when she really never could hate Azula if she tried.

Azula says no more. She goes to return to whatever it is she was doing.

Ty Lee knows she is not supposed to be out, even if Azula never explicitly stated it. But Azula did nothing. Azula is… too lenient with her prisoner, and that scares Ty Lee.

She must have something truly awful in mind.

It is the only explanation.

 ** _###_**

"I am not overjoyed to be visiting you," Mai says, sitting at Ty Lee's bedside. "Yet, I am doing it of my own volition. Why?"

"Because we're best friends," Ty Lee replies, grinning from ear to ear. Mai looks at her as if she is insane. "What? What is it?"

"I just didn't think you'd consider us to be friends after this whole Dragon Queen thing," Mai says, a very slight hint of curiosity in her tone. She barely ever gives away emotion in words, but Ty Lee can tell that Mai really _is_ stunned by the fact that they will be friends forever.

Ty Lee reaches out and holds one of Mai's hands. That seems to confuse her further.

"We're best friends forever and ever, no matter what. Whether you're marrying my true love or helping her destroy the world or not!" Ty Lee chirps, trying to hug Mai. She stops herself when she feels the pain.

"I haven't ever seen Ryzu attack someone without Azula telling him to," Mai curiously comments, eyeing the bandages wrapped around Ty Lee's ribcage. "He must hate you for some reason. Or maybe you just smell too perfumey. You always smell like perfume and I have no idea how you do while here."

Ty Lee shrugs. "I really only can smell smoke anymore. It's probably like _really_ bad for me."

"Really bad for anyone." Mai shifts her gaze as if she has said something horrible. Ty Lee narrows her eyes. "But it's not a problem. The world is like a phoenix, or whatever Azula says during her speeches."

Ty Lee powers through the pain and sits up, leaning closer to Mai. She can feel the heat of her best friend and romantic rival as she whispers into her ear, "Are you scared of Azula?"

Mai takes a long time to reply, leaving Ty Lee nervous as could be.

"No," says Mai. "I am afraid of something infinitely her greater and infinitely more vengeful."

Mai rises and vacates the room. She must have known that Ty Lee was going to ask more questions, and was too afraid to answer them.

Ty Lee has never known Mai to be scared like that.

She thinks about the panicked orders to not pick flowers. And she thinks about the way that everyone seems on edge.

It takes a while longer than it should for Ty Lee to piece it together, thinking through every minute aspect of Mai and the soldiers and Dragon Queen Azula herself, but, when she does, she is revolted. It is the scariest revelation she has had since the fact that Azula and her dragons and spirits and armies had conquered the world more cruelly and swiftly than Sozin ever could.

This is worse, so much worse.

She thought Azula was commanding the spirits.

But she now knows she was wrong.

The spirits are commanding Azula.


	13. Chapter Twelve

_Princess Azula has taken Caldera. Ty Lee stands with Zuko and Mai, locked in the back of the palace. The shrieks of spirits and Ryzu and the metal of the armies Azula gathered pound against Ty Lee's ears until she hears nothing but fear._

 _Acrid smoke permeates the air, and so the trio can barely breathe. Zuko sits silently, feeling he will throw up if he even moves. It pains him to see his empire fall, the one he tried to rescue, the one he formed to restore balance and right wrongs._

 _They hear footsteps in the hall and Ty Lee grabs onto Mai. Her best friend stands perfectly still, as expressionless and cold as a statue. Ty Lee knows she does it to hide her fear._

 _Now, the moment of their demise has arrived. None of them comprehend how powerful it will be. The door unlocks. Ty Lee expects a flood of soldiers to slaughter her._

 _Instead, one person walks inside._

 _Azula._

 _She looks at her former friends and forgets about the love they once had. It was a long time ago, and they broke it when they all betrayed her. The chain of destruction needs to be avenged, in her mind, but she does consider it wise to give them an opportunity._

 _"Join me or die," she says calmly, considering herself quite generous for offering anything but death by lightning. Ty Lee wonders if Azula even notices the blood and ash staining her skin, hair and clothes. Maybe she wears it like war paint, like make-up._

 _Zuko shakes his head. "You can't take the throne. It doesn't belong to you. You're not the rightful Fire Lord."_

 _He chokes on his words. Azula smirks, pleased with herself._

 _The havoc she wreaked on this world ends and begins here, in the final city she must conquer. She knows he has felt deep dread as he tried to save the world and failed. All he could do is wait in his tower, locked up like she was with her son, and wait for his death to come._

 _"No, I am not, ZuZu. They call me Dragon Queen now, and I quite like it. It has a better ring to it than Fire Lord. However, I would very much like the physical throne. You are in no position to defy me," Azula says with a sparkle in her eyes. After her words, Ty Lee hears the metal footsteps getting closer and closer. The army is here._

 _"No," says Zuko, regaining some of his courage._

 _But it is not enough to deter his baby sister._

 _Mai slowly begins to walk towards the Dragon Queen. Azula holds up two fingers, ready to strike her down. But Mai says, "I don't have anything here worth dying for. I'll take your offer."_

 _Azula winks at her brother. It infuriates him, but what can he do?_

 _"I knew you had it in you to make the right choice for once," Azula says._

 _Zuko and Ty Lee are still in shock._

 _"Azula, you can't…" Zuko begins, although he does not know. He could fight her. He_ should _fight her, and so his fingers begin to smoke._

 _"Ty Lee," Azula says, locking eyes with her as Zuko approaches. "Ty Lee, you always wanted to rule the world by my side. I have learned forgiveness from the spirits and I will give you another chance to be with me."_

 _She holds out one hand. Ty Lee gazes at it and thinks about the life she once dreamt up. No, it is dead now that she is older and wiser._

 _Zuko strikes his sister and singes her hair. She grabs him and stifles the fire, throwing him to the floor. Azula touches her smoking bang, stunned that he snuck up on her. She glares at Ty Lee and sets her foot on her brother's neck._

 _Just in time, a water whip grabs Azula by the arm and pulls her down onto the stone floor._

 _Mai draws knives and pins Katara to the wall. Katara begins to break free as her brother enters. Azula slowly rises and fights him and Zuko at once._

 _No Avatar._

 _Azula realizes what that means. He is outside._

 _Ryzu is outside._

 _"Mai, take care of them," Azula orders, dodging three warriors and running to the city._

 _She sees the Avatar beginning to rise into the air. Azula runs to her son, to free him, to give him life even if she is defeated._

 _Then the dark tendrils of the spirits rise and grab him by the arms and legs._

 _He does not fall or die or electrocute like she saw once._

 _Avatar Aang vanishes into thin air._

 _What a reprise._

 _Azula turns to Ryzu and touches his bloodied scales. It is not from his own injury, and she runs back to the palace, relieved._

 _When she arrives, Mai leans against the wall._

 _Zuko, Ty Lee and the water peasants are gone. They fled._

 _"I hate water," Mai says, fighting against the ice._

 _Azula melts the prison._

 _She looks around. "Which way did she go?"_

 _"_ They _ran through some passage," Mai says._

 _Dragon Queen makes her decision. She walks to the throne room and lets the city burn and be reborn as her Capital._

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee sits in the courtyard in the morning after asking to be taken out here again. Her body hurts terribly from the scratch, but she focuses on nature. She wishes Aang were around. He would know what to do about the spirits.

Maybe they deserve to reclaim this world after the Fire Nation so recklessly destroyed it. Ty Lee does wonder, however, if there are good spirits and bad spirits. She always imagined that they were all fairly neutral on the morality scale, but what they do now is definitely bad.

Mai approaches Ty Lee. "Are you thinking? I didn't know you did much of that."

"It's hard not to in times like these," Ty Lee says. "I just wonder how things got to be this way."

"The world?" Mai asks, a brief nervous look in her eyes.

"No, not really. I mean, yeah, sure, but I mean how they got to be this way between me and Princess Azula. Uh, Dragon Queen Azula," Ty Lee states unwaveringly, shaking her head too many times.

Mai laughs. Ty Lee has only heard that about five times in her life, and so it instantly cheers her up. Even if Mai is laughing _at_ Ty Lee, she still wants her best friend to be happy. Or at least slightly less bleak.

"You really love her, don't you?" Mai asks. Ty Lee stands and looks at her old best friend. Mai has her hand pressed against her lower back and dark circles under her eyes that are not made of depressing make-up. Her lips are pallid. Her eyes lack luster.

Ty Lee did not know. She did not know that it is bad for everyone, and that Azula is not the only person inflicting pain upon the world. It is not just Azula's revenge; it is bigger than that.

"Yes," Ty Lee whispers, a single tear dropping from her eye.

The Dragon Queen emerges from the gardens. Ty Lee looks up, blushing from embarrassment.

"So, you still love me? How sweet." Mockery. It hurts Ty Lee.

"I've always loved you. I was only with Zuko because he comforted me in my… my grief."

"You were not grieving so much when you destroyed my chance at the throne."

"Well—you—you do have the throne now."

"Yes, but not without undue suffering that you inflicted."

"I was hurting even before then. The minute I was put in my cell, I started to mourn you."

"That was your choice."

"Yeah, and I, and I'm not really sorry, I guess, but I wish it was different. I wish it was all different, you know?"

Azula slowly breathes in and out three times. Ty Lee sweats and shakes.

"We all do." Azula looks away from her old flame. "You never stopped hoping we would have our happily ever after?"

"No, because I will love you until the end of the world." That may have already happened, but Ty Lee means it.

"You always loved me."

Ty Lee softly replies, "Always."

Again, Azula flees what could be beautiful. Ty Lee does not expect anything else, but the words she said softly but meant to scream all made her think that maybe she had a chance.

Mai looks at Ty Lee with pity. "You won't change her. I know you think you see the sweet insane girl who just felt unloved, but you're not going to _fix_ her. No one can. Even you."

"I don't want to fix her. I just want her back."

"Too little, too late." Mai begins to walk her way, but turns back to Ty Lee. "Thank you for saving me. I know I made a different choice this time, but I wish you nothing but the best."

Ty Lee does not know if Mai is making fun of her or not, but she just lets the guards help her back to her room.

Her wounds hurt.

Her head hurts.

Her heart hurts.

She takes the pain syrup to fall asleep.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee sits with Mai.

"How do you feel? Are you okay with the baby?" Ty Lee asks, reaching out to take her best friend's hands. Evidently they are not best friends anymore, because Mai recoils the moment Ty Lee's skin brushes against hers.

"I feel impartial, and the baby is fine. It's a vicious one," Mai says, words she never thought she would talk about a baby like that. She never thought she would have a baby in the first place. "Nothing is out of the ordinary."

Ty Lee sits and plays with her braid. She used to be able to talk to—well talk _at_ —Mai for hours. Now she feels like there are no words to be said.

"Vicious how?" she asks, a bit nervous about it.

"I've felt it move. Vicious like that," Mai says.

Ty Lee just nods.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee finds out just what vicious means the next day.

Mai expresses pain, which Ty Lee has seen maybe once or twice in her whole life. She reaches forward, ignoring her own soreness, and touches Mai's arm. Mai holds back the tears and scream, she leans back against the wall and breathes deeply.

"What's wrong?" Ty Lee asks, taking Mai's hands in hers, desperate, pleading for her friend to confide in her for once.

"I think my rib is broken," Mai whispers. Ty Lee adores that honesty, but she keeps herself from looking happy. "It's nothing. I'll be fine."

Ty Lee forces herself to not frown. "It's not nothing, and I know you'll be fine, but I don't want you to be hurt."

"Well, what am I supposed to do about it?" Mai asks, carefully keeping her words intonationless. "I'm stuck with this, but it's temporary. You need to stop getting involved in business that is not yours."

Ty Lee nods, about to back down, before she changes her mind.

"It's my business. You're my best friend, and so it's my business. I don't want your baby to kill you. Or anybody else. It'll probably kill a lot of people," Ty Lee says, taking Mai by both arms. They feel weak. Mai always has been so extremely strong, but now it seems that the people Ty Lee loves have wasted away at the same rapid rate that the entire world has.

Mai shakes her head at Ty Lee.

"Just stop. You're in way over your head already. You haven't seen anything while playing hide and seek with your husband," Mai says. "I should have never let you escape."

"Mai!"

"She wouldn't have killed you. You know that. Maybe you would be stuck with all of this if I had just done the smart thing and didn't help the Avatar's stupid girlfriend and my stupid ex-boyfriend and _you_."

Ty Lee curls into herself. She has never heard Mai _angry_ at her. Irritated, yes. Angry, no.

"You're my best friend. You've been my best friend forever."

"Shut up," Mai says. "No, I haven't and we both know that. You have much better friends, and we stopped being close a long time ago."

"You. Have. Been. My. Best. Friend. Forever."

"And so you're going to try to help me out? When have you ever cared about me?"

"Always."

Mai turns away, her hand still on her ribcage.

Ty Lee averts her eyes.

She just wishes everything could be okay again.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

Ty Lee is standing on her head with her back against her bedroom wall when guards pound on the door. She nimbly transitions to an upright posture and walks to open the door before they break it down.

"Lady Mai would like to see you," the burliest one says. Ty Lee finds herself gazing at his muscles for a little too long. It makes her feel a strong sense of shame. Ty Lee tells herself it is because she wants to only have eyes for Zuko, but she knows that ship sailed the moment Azula clawed her way out of the mass grave.

It seems so long ago. Ty Lee cannot remember how much time had passed, but it must have been an eternity. The world before the rise of the Dragon Queen does not exist anymore. In fact, it feels like it never did in the first place.

"Okay," chirps Ty Lee. "Just let me get dressed."

She walks back into her room and one of the guards closes the door. Ty Lee frowns at first, but then quietly giggles. It would have been really funny to get undressed. She does not know why; she should not find the idea so hysterical.

Ty Lee dons her clothes and follows the guards to a large room with a beautiful fountain and several mirrors. Several women are at work, and Mai looks like she wants to die. Ty Lee smiles; she missed seeing Mai bored. Bored and in the palace and everything they were supposed to be.

A spirit screeches outside. Maybe not _everything_ , Ty Lee corrects.

"I need you to pick out this stupid wedding stuff," Mai explains, studying her fingernails. She finds them about as remarkable as anything else in the world. "I have no interest in selecting fabrics and flowers."

"I'm so excited!" Ty Lee nearly jumps for joy. She dives into the crowd and gets to work setting up a dream wedding. She stops to examine the flowers first, and looks up at Mai. "Do you want the wedding I planned for you and Zuko or the one I planned for me and Azula?"

"Neither?" Mai sighs. "Oh, I don't care. Surprise me."

Ty Lee decides on the one she had planned for herself. It is much more fitting for the Dragon Queen. It was plotted in great detail to revolve around her, after all.

 _ **###**_

An hour into the affair Mai calls grim and Ty Lee calls exciting, Mai says to Ty Lee, "You could've escaped. You've had a lot of opportunities."

"I'm sure I'd get caught," Ty Lee brightly replies, rubbing her hand on a sample of dress fabric and trying not to look Mai in the eyes. She does not want to have this discussion, but she does not say no to friends either.

"Maybe." Mai finally catches Ty Lee's gaze. "I just figured, since you're clearly having second thoughts, you'd want to stop playing prisoner and run off."

Ty Lee sets down the fabric and forgets the commotion in the room. All she sees is Mai on that gilded chair, and all she hears is the throbbing of blood rushing to her head. "What?"

"Second thoughts about killing her," says Mai. She speaks as if she were discussing the weather, not the assassination of the most powerful person in the world.

"Why would I kill her?" Ty Lee asks nervously, teetering on her feet without noticing.

"Because she's the Dragon Queen and mad with power, and because I'm sure Zuko had to tell you to come here—or at least _someone_ did—because you never could think for yourself." Mai says that and another thought occurs to her. "Maybe that's why you haven't escaped. You needed someone to tell you to."

"What?" Ty Lee repeats, lacking any other words to turn to.

"You don't have to act like you don't know what I'm talking about. I'm sure she knows. If I didn't value my life, I'd ask her why she hasn't killed _you_ yet. She'd do it first." Mai scratches her cheek and continues treating the topic with a dreadful apathy.

"I don't know…" Ty Lee takes a breath. She looks away. "I don't know how to answer any of this. I just don't."

"Alright then," says Mai.

Ty Lee flashes a big smile at her and gets back to her work.

 _ **###**_

That evening, after servants bring Ty Lee her dinner, she executes her escape. She knew there was a way out all along, but she never had the guts to use it. Ty Lee unlatches the window, swings from the sill and lands on the nearby balcony.

She pulls a pin from her braid and picks the lock, sidling inside without making a sound. Then, Ty Lee walks to where she knows she will find the Dragon Queen: up a long, long flight of stairs at Ryzu's roost.

Lo and behold, Ty Lee finds Azula kneeling beside her son, stroking his scales and talking softly to him. Ty Lee's stomach lurches and she changes her mind about coming here. Azula has not seen her, and so she spins to hastily exit.

She was clearly wrong, because Azula says, "You went out of your way to come up here. You cannot simply turn back now."

Ty Lee turns, her head hung in a childish shame she had forgotten with age. Azula smirks at her and Ryzu sighs smoke.

"I just wanted to ask you why you haven't killed me yet," Ty Lee says, trying her best to be brave. It is difficult, however, when she feels so overwhelmingly afraid.

"I want to play with you for a while," Azula answers, her smirk twisting further. "Is that so bad? It might be unlike the me you fantasize about, but it is the me you betrayed at the Boiling Rock and left in imprisoned in a tower without a single visit."

"You're you, and I love you, of course," Ty Lee replies, managing to smile.

"I find it funny that you escaped and ran all the way up here. It is like escaping a wolf den by running into the maw of a tiger-zebra. My test, I see, yielded surprising results," coolly says Azula.

"Test?"

"Ty Lee, I know you, and I know you could very easily get from that window to that balcony. A less curious person would have welded it shut," Azula says. She rests her hand on Ryzu for a moment and then stands.

"Did you trust me?" Ty Lee hopefully asks.

"The opposite. I wanted to test your dedication," says Azula. "At first, it was your dedication to killing me, but you seem to have lost interest in that. I have no idea why you want to be here. Your love for me could not be that powerful. What is it you are seeking in my city? In my palace?"

Ty Lee's heart begs her to whisper, _"You."_

Her lips disagree, and she loudly says, "To find a way to stop the spirits and dragons."

If Azula does not believe her, she does not comment.

"Then our interests do not align. Unfortunate, but to be expected," says Azula.

"I wish they did, your highness," demurely says Ty Lee, batting her eyelashes for good measure.

Azula sets a hand on Ryzu. She stands and walks to Ty Lee.

"Knock me off of the tower," she says, making the acrobat's eyes bulge. "Go ahead."

"R-Ryzu would eat me," Ty Lee complains.

"I am the way to stop the spirits and the dragons," says Azula. "I am their voice and hand in this world. Without me, without my natural born talents with dragons, they would be far easier to defeat. So, knock me off of the tower."

Azula weaves backwards and stands over the edge. She faces Ty Lee, a wicked gleam in her golden eyes. It makes Ty Lee fall for her again, which is sickening.

"Would you drag me down with you?" Ty Lee whispers, willing her hands to stop shaking to no avail. She sees Azula's eyes flit to them, witnesses Azula sizing her up.

 _ **###**_

 _"I wish I could see a dragon," Ty Lee languidly remarks. She lies on the beach with Azula. They are not naked, but their clothes are half discarded, and they are coated with a thin layer of sand. Ty Lee feels it matting her hair but cannot think about her beauty while looking at someone so beautiful. "I really love them."_

 _Azula turns over, her elbow resting beside Ty Lee's ribcage, her sandy raven locks tickling Ty Lee's face and neck as they danced on the breath of the sea breeze._

 _"I_ am _a dragon," Azula confidently states. Ty Lee stares up at her._

 _"Well, then the paintings of them don't do them any justice. They are so much more beautiful than I thought they were," Ty Lee says softly. It is not the flirting she indulged in, the kind she claimed to be qualified enough to teach last night._

 _Azula laughs that wicked laugh. Ty Lee does not know if she should be scared or thrilled. She supposes she is a little of both._

 _"Well, if I ever find a dragon, I promise to let you meet him," Azula says._

 _Ty Lee grins. "I'd like that a lot."_

 _She knows Azula tells lies like that, but they are such gorgeous, tempting falsehoods that she falls fast when she hears them._

 _Azula might be bad at flirting, but she is very good at using people._

 _ **###**_

"Yes," Azula says, the smoky wind picking up, causing her hair to billow. She looks both terrifying and grand; Ty Lee could not look away if she tried. "But you risked death in order to bring them down. So, risk it again."

Ty Lee tries to come up with another reason, but cannot.

She walks forward. Ryzu bares his teeth and growls, giving Ty Lee gooseflesh.

"I think I'd want to be dragged down with you," Ty Lee says, her voice barely audible over the bleak, loud city below them. "It wouldn't be a bad way to die."

Azula slowly shakes her head. "I am never going back to you. You had more than one chance to be with me, and now I am with Mai. She is having my child and we will be wed in five days. There is nothing you can do."

"Mai's the same as me. We're your dolls. We always were," Ty Lee hoarsely says. The smoke and fear take a toll on her; she struggles to breathe now.

"Yes, you are, and it may not seem like it right now, but I love all of my dolls." Azula returns to Ryzu's side. Ty Lee stands still. "Would you jump if I asked you to?"

Ty Lee replies instantly, "No."

"The only way you could ever regain my affection is by answering _yes_." Azula runs her hand over Ryzu's wing. "Such a shame. Maybe I just love Mai more than I love you."

"I'm sure you do," Ty Lee says quietly. "You don't love anybody, so…"

"I love my son," Azula fiercely retorts, a passion behind her words Ty Lee has never heard. "And I love my empire. That is enough for me. He speaks. Would you like to feel?"

Ty Lee strides over and kneels a healthy distance away from the Dragon Queen. Ryzu has attacked her more than once, and so she also is wary of him.

Azula reaches out and takes Ty Lee's hand. The former Fire Lady's heart begins to race, a rush hitting her veins that feels like liquefied lightning. Dragon Queen Azula sets Ty Lee's hand down on Ryzu.

Ty Lee does not know what she should be listening for until she feels it. Or sees it. No, just _feels it_. There is nothing to be heard or seen; she just _knows_. It is a method of communication Ty Lee thinks humans would benefit from.

"What did he say?" Azula asks softly.

In a frightened, hollow whisper, Ty Lee honestly replies, "That I don't deserve your love, and that he would never have me as his other mother." Ty Lee stands up and walks towards the door.

Azula watches her leave.

She does not bother calling for guards or escorting her prisoner; Ty Lee will never leave this palace. Azula knows that for certain.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee lies in bed the night before Azula will wed someone other than her. It is the worst feeling in the entire world. To know that the woman you love soon will belong to another—or another will soon belong to her—is purely soul-crushing.

She lies awake, tossing and turning. No position can be comfortable when her soul aches and her heart feels heavy in her chest. Ty Lee does not think she has ever been so sad. No, the only other time she has been so heartbroken is when Azula never came home.

Now she is to blame for things she did in her grief.

It was probably wrong to fall for someone's brother while in mourning, but Azula was not alive then. Everyone thought she was dead.

Ty Lee gets up and out of bed. She sits beneath the window and lets the tears fall freely.

Her sobbing gets louder and louder until someone bangs on the door. She rises and opens it. A guard. Huh. He steps inside and shuts the door behind him.

"I can kill you with one punch."

"Why are you crying?" asks someone she knows. "Are you hurt? Did she hurt you?"

Ty Lee throws her arms around him and sobs into his strong shoulder.

Even though it scares her, she whispers his name. "Zuko. Zuko, she's getting married tomorrow. She's getting married tomorrow."

"Then I guess that makes you two even," softly says Zuko. "I want you so bad. I want you so bad, please."

"But tell me how and why you're here," Ty Lee pleads, tears twinkling in her tawny eyes.

"You took a long time. I pulled a favor with some guys who were still loyal to me and not her. They hooked me up with fake papers and a couple uniforms. I was worried about you. I came here for _you_." Zuko kisses her. "I would do anything for you."

Ty Lee gnaws at her lower lip. She would do anything for _Azula_ , not him. Ty Lee cannot be a heartbreaker; she was not made that way.

"I feel the same way about you," Ty Lee whispers in his ear. She embraces him and sucks in his warmth for as long as she can.

Finally, she releases him when someone bangs on the door. Zuko quickly returns his helmet to his head and stands. He rushes to the window and opens it, then slides it closed as Azula walks inside. Ty Lee's heart begins to race wildly. If Azula catches her brother, she surely will kill him.

Ty Lee says, "You can leave now. The window is good."

Zuko silently nods and exits the room. Ty Lee admires his smooth motions and nonchalance during such a scary situation.

As he begins to shut the door, Azula addresses him, making Ty Lee's heart stop. "Stand guard with whoever is out there. I want to be alone and undisturbed. It _is_ the night before my wedding."

Zuko nods and gets out as fast as possible.

Ty Lee gazes at Azula as they wait for the door to lock and the guards to fall silent.

"We're going to have sex," says Azula very bluntly, unlike her usual riddles. "I want to do this before I wed. With you, that is. I am not certain what will happen to me and Mai after seeing you and Zuko back before I was in power. I want to be with you while I can."

Ty Lee swoons over the command. She does love being ordered around and Zuko never does that. Ty Lee eagerly leans in to her love and kisses her neck. Azula shivers.

Neither woman has any reservations about doing this.

 ** _###_**

Azula leaves immediately afterwards. Ty Lee understands; she has a wedding tomorrow.

However, that gives Zuko ample opportunity to walk in. Ty Lee barely has a few moments to put on a robe before he enters. Softly, he shuts the door behind him, then he walks up to her and looks straight into her eyes.

Ty Lee cannot look away despite the shame she feels.

"You slept with her," states Zuko, no emotion in his voice. That frightens Ty Lee.

"I'm trying to win her over. Don't you see? This is more complicated than Azula on a power-trip. The spirits are controlling her. She's a mouthpiece for them, and we have to stop this at the source. It'll take a lot more than just stabbing Azula in the neck to save the world," Ty Lee whispers, wrapping her arms around him. She tenderly kisses him and ignores the lack of heat. Azula lit her on fire, Zuko barely creates a spark.

"Do you love her?" asks Zuko. Ty Lee averts his eyes. That is the only answer he needs. "I never thought about her returning from the dead, but if I did, I always would've known that you'd go back to her. I was just the closest thing to her you've had."

"I've— _Zuko_ —I've had feelings for her since I was a little girl who felt electricity when she pulled on my braid in class. I have loved her for as long as I can remember, and I broke her. I broke her and I need to atone." Ty Lee breathes in and Zuko watches her lips and the glow of her cheeks. She lights up brighter than the sun when she speaks about Azula. "But I love you too. I love you a lot. And I think she and Mai love each other. It might not be the same way, but I believe that there's more than one perfect person for everybody out there. Maybe Mai is her other perfect person and you're mine. We can accept that."

Ty Lee kisses Zuko's cheek. Hesitantly, she kisses his scar. He never has allowed it; her lips on his biggest insecurity never flew in their relationship. But right now, it signifies the trust between them. They must trust each other to destroy the dark spirits and save the world.

"Have you seen Ryzu?" asks Zuko.

Ty Lee bitterly recalls his most recent words to her and the times he bit or scratched her. She brushes that sadness aside and tries to keep her energy positive. They need that now.

"I've seen worse. Mai is…" Ty Lee does not know if pregnant is the right word, but it is all she thinks up. "Mai is pregnant with another one. Another dragon. That's why they're getting married."

Zuko's face says a thousand words. He fears for Mai more than he feared for Ty Lee.

Maybe it will work out right. Maybe the two couples will return in all their glory, save the world and go make a bonfire on Ember Island.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

The sun begins to rise.


	15. Chapter Fourteen

_At her coronation, the female fire sage reads the newly written words. The old ones were thrown out with the old regime. Dragon Queen Azula shall build a new world. A better one._

 _"She is fire, she is light, she is ash, and she is embers. She is Dragon Queen Azula, and she bows for no one and nothing as she leads us into a rebirth," declares the woman._

 _The last part about bowing was added by Azula to allay concerns about the spirits having true control. She knows people doubt her command._

 _Azula doubts it herself, but she tries not to think that way._

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee used to love weddings. They were her favorite thing in the entire world. Her own was ecstatic and amazing and incredible, even if it was to an unexpected person. These glorious, lovely days of fire and family always made her feel vibrant and alive, but, today, outside in a humongous ceremony in a city that smells and tastes like ash, she feels dead inside. Azula is marrying Mai. Ty Lee cannot think of a worse union.

To make matters worse, she knows that her husband is watching. He managed to get himself tasked with guarding her while she stands in the corner, away from the bonfire in the center of the ceremony and the two women being bound by it. Yet, she knows she would feel no warmth even if she were not so far away.

The crowd is the largest Ty Lee has seen in a long time. Ordinarily such a gathering of humans would be too suspicious to the spirits.

Azula looks madly beautiful, which is fitting for a woman who is beautifully mad.

Ty Lee gazes at her.

Zuko notices, of course. He also notices that Mai looks dreadful. Azula seems as broken as everyone else in attendance, as wan and tired, but he thinks Mai might drop dead before she even finishes the union. Zuko briefly fantasizes about that and wants to throw himself off of the roof for it.

Then again, maybe it would be better if they all just died. If the fire grew out of control and burned even Azula to the bone. Or if an earthquake struck and the sea rose up to wash away all life left on this miserable planet of worthless, lost souls.

He sighs to himself and averts his eyes from the fire sages.

 _ **###**_

At the reception, Zuko watches Mai approach him. No, not him; she must be coming up to Ty Lee. He straightens his back and tries to keep his breath under control.

"If anybody comes up to you and tries to talk to you tonight or any time after the wedding while Azula can't keep jealously guarding you, I want you to keep something in mind. No one can be trusted," gravely says Mai to Ty Lee, true severity in her amber eyes instead of their usual nihilistic dullness. "No one."

At that moment, Zuko wonders if she recognizes him even through the dehumanizing uniform. She _could_ , which terrifies the former Fire Lord to the core. He wants to believe she has not lost an ounce of herself, but Zuko never was a gambling man.

"I figured," replies Ty Lee. "I'm not really understanding why you would say that, though."

"Just listen to that and keep it in mind. You're too trusting," Mai whispers, shooting a furtive glance over her shoulder. "You always were gullible and I don't want you to stay that way."

"I promise I won't trust anyone," Ty Lee nervously agrees but Mai does not seem swayed. Zuko will admit Ty Lee did not make a very enthusiastic testimony.

"I'll see you," Mai says, turning and walking away from Ty Lee.

She pauses—looking around—then thinks better of it and keeps moving.

 _ **###**_

Ty Lee neglects to partake in the celebration with the other revelers. She stands with her back to Zuko and looks at the wedding she once planned for herself and Azula. Ty Lee would trade absolutely anything to be standing where Mai is right now.

How can she enjoy a party she planned for another, far more joyous occasion?

They say the food is the best part.

Ty Lee feels too heartbroken to eat.

 _ **###**_

That night, after the reception ends and Ty Lee's guards return her to her room, she turns to Zuko. He shuts himself inside with his wife and she tries to find words. The luxury of ignoring him has gone away now that they are alone together.

"It's good that we don't have to think about them anymore," Ty Lee halfheartedly says, chewing on her fingernails as Zuko removes his helmet and sits down on her bed. He gets a good look at her eyes for the first time and sees that they are tearstained. "We're better off for it. No more regrets: just love."

Sarcastically, Zuko replies, "Well, don't sound so happy."

"You see right through me, huh?" Ty Lee whispers, sitting down.

"You're not hiding how unhappy you are. All your life you wanted to marry Azula," Zuko says, staying surprisingly calm. "It was your dream and now you have to abandon it. All my life I wanted to marry Mai, even after I was banished and thought I'd never get the privilege. That hurts me, but I know I can't understand you since I didn't love her half as much as you love my sister."

"Zuko," Ty Lee whispers, "I think we should run away again."

"What about the mission? What about dethroning Azula and stopping the spirits?" Zuko states, his eyes lighting ablaze with passion. Ty Lee wonders where he can find it on a night like this. "We can't let a little heartbreak stop us."

"Leave that up to Aang, wherever he is. Let's run away into the forest and never look back," Ty Lee says, leaning towards him. "I love you. No, not as much as I love her but I love you and I think we should just disappear. People will let things slide tonight. It's been a big party and I think we can make it out of here in one piece."

Zuko stands up. "I'm seeing this through to the end. I'll let you out of your prison if you want and you can go, but I'm staying."

Ty Lee glares at him. He never has seen her do that before and it frightens him.

"Do you love me?" she asks hoarsely, rising to face him. "Do you love me?"

"I…" Zuko squeezes his eyes shut. "Yes. I love you a lot. I was never using you to get over someone else like you were using me. I've loved you from the beginning."

"Then run with me. The world is over and we should just accept that and try to live the rest of our days as happily as we can," Ty Lee states, grabbing his hands and stepping closer and closer. He smells the sweet perfume of her scent and knows he is losing his footing in the argument.

Zuko kisses her on the lips and she kisses him back.

They lean closer and closer. She rolls up his shirt and he pulls it over his head and she falls back onto the bed, he on top of her. He brushes his lips against her neck and she giggles from how much it tickles.

She sets her hands on his back, ready to pull him even closer, but then the door opens.

"Zuko?" asks… Mai. _Mai_?

"Aren't you on your wedding night?" he demands, even though he knows he should probably be coming up with an excuse or punching her in the jaw and running away. It would take her five seconds to signal the spirits or dragons or _worst of all_ her new wife.

"It's not much of a wedding night when I am so knocked up. I came to talk to Ty Lee but I guess I was interrupting…" Mai looks at them and they both feel like a parent caught them with their hands in the cookie jar.

"Where's Azula?" Zuko asks.

"With Ryzu. She spends all of her time with him, up in that tower. I think she got used to it when you kept her locked up in one for so long," Mai says, peeking her head out into the hallway and then shutting the door behind her. Ty Lee has to admire how she can easily roll with this shock. "Zuko, why did you come here?"

"Ty Lee was taking her time and I was worried," Zuko admits. "I thought it would be easier for her to kill Azula."

Mai laughs. Zuko has heard that on _very_ few occasions and it humiliates him. Ty Lee furrows her brow, concerned for them both.

"You did?" Mai smirks. "You're even dumber than you look. I don't think Azula is the problem. She was chosen to do the work of some really pissed off creatures that wanted her to enslave humanity. Is that the kind of thing she dreams about? Yes. Do they really need her now? No."

Zuko wipes his mouth and sits up. "Look, we need to do something."

"Why?" Mai asks, her eyes flitting up and down his form. He still looks fantastic shirtless but it does not yet make up for the hero complex. "We weren't chosen by anyone like she was, and three people can't quite win a war. Or start one, usually."

"Sozin was only one person."

Mai retorts instantly, "He had an army and a magic comet."

"Wait…" Ty Lee says slowly. "You said three people."

"I could say four. As much as I think she would enjoy feeding you to Ryzu, Azula isn't wasteful. She wants out of this situation as much as we do," says Mai. "This issue transcends personal feelings and political opinions. Do you hear the screams outside? It's easy to forget about them."

"I'm confused," Zuko says, cocking an eyebrow. "You flipped sides and I…"

"I regret it," Mai admits. "And I bet Azula regrets bringing back those dragons too. She's a mess. Even more than right after the war ended."

"Well, if you're suddenly so passionate about something, what do you propose we do?"

"Build a campfire and sing some songs." Mai rolls her eyes. "I don't know, but I think the four of us should meet up."

"I'm not getting eaten."

"You can risk getting eaten being brave and facing your sister or you can wait until someone catches you and you get eaten as a coward. Your choice."

"And that's why I married Ty Lee."

"What?"

"Nothing." Zuko clears his throat. "Fine. Why don't we head up to that tower?"

 _ **###**_

Azula sits, stroking Ryzu, when footsteps clamor up her stairs. She rises to knock some sense into whoever dares to bother her until she sees Mai, a masked guard, and Ty Lee not in handcuffs.

"What is it?" Azula demands.

"Will you promise you won't get mad?" asks Ty Lee.

"No," hisses Azula, glowering for good measure.

"Okay. Worth a try." Ty Lee shrugs and titters anxiously.

Mai and Ty Lee both look to the former Fire Lord. Zuko groans when he removes his helmet. He better not wind up inside of that dragon's stomach.

Ryzu begins to growl when he senses his mother's angry shock. She tries to choke out his name but feels like someone punched her in the gut and knocked the winds out of her. He cannot show up like this, back in his old palace in his conquered city.

"Please don't have me eaten by Ryzu," Zuko mutters, hating to beg but deciding his life is worth a little loss of dignity. "It wasn't my idea to reveal myself."

"No…" Azula dreamily says, looking through him instead of at him. Ryzu snaps and snarls at the man he remembers from when he was growing up. "I will hear your plea, like a reasonable Queen. Ryzu, calm down. You can chew him to bloody oblivion later… if he crosses me."

Zuko does not say another word. He will not give her the satisfaction.

"Why would you two expose him?" Azula asks, glancing at her pseudo-best friends. Her wife and her prisoner, she supposes they are now. "He is on your side."

"The four of us aren't a bad team," Zuko says.

Azula snarls through bared teeth, "I asked Mai and Ty Lee," and Ryzu growls in tandem.

Ty Lee answers. "Do you want what we want?"

"I want to be the Dragon Queen. Ruling the world is what I have always dreamed of and I will give it up for nothing. I do not care who else must suffer," Azula coldly states, walking past her son to stand across from Zuko. She has a way of dwarfing people despite her small stature.

Due to the speechlessness of everyone else, Mai steps up and flatly, coolly says, "Your power is meaningless when there is no one left to rule."

Azula averts her eyes.


	16. Chapter Fifteen

_In the burning Caldera, Mai turns to the Dragon Queen, her betrothed. They stand in the throne room after Azula held a meeting with spirits caught between worlds._

 _Mai remarks, in response to Azula's supposedly grand plan, "_ _A loyal sellsword is as common as a virgin whore."_

 _Azula instantly shrugs off that mild concern. "_ _They will quickly become as loyal to me as my soldiers._ More _loyal, seeing as so many decided they would rather be a snack for Ryzu than a good defender of the Fire Nation. I offer them gold but I also offer them purpose."_

 _Mai does not think this will work out as well as Azula intends. Then again, she has Ryzu, dragon ghosts, the unborn dragon inside of Mai, the unstoppable angry spirits and countless other capable people who fear her enough to fight for her._

 _Maybe she can pull it off._

 _Mai decides it is not worth caring about (she makes that choice quite often)._ _"_ _Is this worth it?"_

 _"_ _I promised the spirits an army and I never fail to deliver," says Azula coolly, glowering at her fiancee._

 _"_ _Azula," says Mai, touching her arm. It has little effect. "Do you remember the Dai Li?"_

 _"_ _Yes, obviously I do," Azula snarls._

 _"_ _And the soldiers who fought for you. And the turncoats from the other side. And me and T—and your other allies," Mai dryly lists, not making the point very clear to the Dragon Queen._

 _"_ _I can recall my feats as a charismatic leader. Have you reconsidered your position?"_

 _"_ _All of those people fought because they believed in you. They were fighting for you, not fighting because they're afraid of being eaten by Ryzu or gutted by dark spirits."_

 _"_ _I will give the people something to believe in, but for now I must control them. Fear is the best way to control people."_

 _Mai licks her lips and brushes her fingertips across the bump on her stomach. A dragon. Her worst fear; at the moment, it exceeds worries about Azula's madness (the main concern of the populace and the corporeal members of her court)._

 _"_ _Whatever works," Mai says, because she has seen what Azula can do. She was there when Caldera fell; she switched sides due to what she witnessed._

 _Maybe her army will serve her honorably eventually._

 _But she is gone._

 _Too far gone for anyone to save her._

 ** _###_**

Right now, Azula stands with her old friends, her former friends, or something like that. They have made her realize that she needs to make bolder moves if she wants to keep up with the game the spirits play. They have given her an idea - one not fully formed, but a good one - and she allows it to race in her head.

"You are on my side now," Azula says, glancing between them. "I think since I have a dragon, several armies and ultimate power, you don't have any choice but to agree. You. Are. On. My. Side. Now. OrIwillburnyoualive."

The other three exchange glances. They do not seem to take her seriously, which makes the side of her lip twitch.

Zuko stammers, "I—I don't know if—"

With smoldering golden eyes, Azula demands, "For our current purposes, you are on my side. You will assist me in my further conquest."

They at last pick up on it. She cannot _say_ the true meaning, but they comprehend it. Her former friends have no other choice than to join Team Dragon Queen until their time comes.

"I am going to imprison you two," Azula orders. "But I will find an advantage in your skills."

Silence.

Zuko hates to trust her, but he knows he must take a gamble to save the world. Someone needs to do something before the cities and people are nothing but ashes.

Therefore, he nobly accepts the handcuffs and the dank dungeon.

Ty Lee returns to her locked room.

Mai touches Ryzu and tries to ignore her racing thoughts.

 ** _###_**

After her conversation with Zuko, Ty Lee and Mai, Azula tears at her hair and clenches her jaw and _needs_ to _just_ scream. She picked up the bad habit at some point and it never faded away. She does not know if she wants to play along with Zuko and Mai and Ty Lee. Maybe they are… right. Maybe they are right. She _knows_ she has no control, that this is not how she wanted to win, but she does not want to lose her position of power either.

The spirits gave her much. Yet, she does not like being their slave in the slightest.

In a fit of rage, she throws everything off of her desk. The clatter of her belongings smashing on the floor does not satisfy her the way she thought it would.

She begins to cry, grateful to be alone. No one sees her break down, clinging to her desk until her knuckles turn white. The tears drip down and fall onto the parchment beneath her.

Azula is a slave. She thought she would have riches and glory and everything that comes with reigning over Caldera. _But she is a slave._ The spirits use her to get what they want and she lives in as much fear of them as everyone else in the world.

She knows she should team up with them. It would be wise.

But she has power and prestige with the spirits.

Zuko would take that away the instant she won his war for him.

Then again, he has always been so easy to use. Azula could succeed and get rid of him when the time came.

Could she win without him?

She does not know.

 **###**

Azula visits the dungeons in the dead of the night, her palm alit with bright blue flame. She walks to Zuko's cell and stands there until he turns his attention to her.

"Do you trust me?" Azula asks her brother, locking eyes with him.

He averts his gaze. "No."

Azula shrugs; she expected no less. "Fair enough. I am going to make a decision right now that is going to make you very unhappy, but it is an invaluable temporary measure until I figure out a way to make what we discussed in the tower possible."

"I still don't like this."

"I don't care."

"I figured that."

"Just be patient." She grabs him by the arm, digging in her sharp nails, and screams. "Your trial is after Ty Lee's. Just keep your mouth shut down here and I will take care of those loyal to me. Are you loyal to me?"

He picks up on her tone. He knows her. . . and he is not stupid. Whatever her scheme is, he will play along until it becomes clear that she must be stopped. At this point, it is the best chance the world has if it wants to recover.

"I can be patient. My life has essentially been an exercise in patience."

"Yet, you still tend to be terrible at it." She smirks. He sighs.

"Can you wish her luck on her trial?" Zuko asks and Azula suddenly sneers. He certainly touched a fresh wound with the subtle reminder that he and Ty Lee were in love while she was allegedly dead.

"Not from you."

And the Dragon Queen vanishes as quickly as she appeared.

 ** _###_**

Later that pitch black night, Azula cries in her bedroom. Not for her brother, but for herself.

Is she this pathetic a ruler? How did she create a land of ashes, a land she does not herself control, when Ozai groomed her for so long?

She wipes away her tears and opens her door to face one of her royal guards. He bows to her and she pouts at it. Unsatisfactory, but she needs a messenger.

"Fetch Ty Lee for me," she coolly orders and he quickly rises and vanishes down the hallway.

Azula wants her. Maybe she just married someone else, but she needs _something_ to remind her why she deserves to be the Dragon Queen. Someone she can so easily convert to her side.

When Ty Lee arrives, Azula slams the door shut and turns to her. She examines her, looking right through her and giving Ty Lee uncomfortable chills. Azula kisses her and bites down on her lower lip. She steps back after that and sits in an antique chair as if it is a throne.

"Would you swear fealty to me and recant your love for my brother and crimes against my nation?" Azula demands, clasping her hands on her lap.

"The first one I would do in a heartbeat. . ." Ty Lee trails off, thinking to herself, _The second one is too hard, too wrong._

"Then you mean nothing to me and I will get rid of you. Your attempted treason against the spirits has unsettled me," Azula says, as cold as her father. Ty Lee thinks her teeth might chatter as Azula's words freeze the previously hot room.

"You're perfect and I want to—"

"No one is perfect. Not even me." _I never was._ "I am far, far from infallible and I am sick of your meaningless compliments that only a fool would believe."

Ty Lee does not hesitate to reply honestly _,_ "You only think that because you can't see yourself through my eyes."

Azula pinches the bridge of her nose. She honestly does not know if she can handle this. She should have started with someone else. But a recant of Ty Lee's treasonous beliefs would be useful.

"Tell me something truthful," Azula brusquely orders.

"I would run away with you in a heartbeat. Away from both sides of the war. Nothing could stop us if we teamed up. Not even all the spirits in both worlds combined and your brother and the Avatar or _anybody_. We're like the strongest people in the whole Universe. Let's just run away and forget about Zuko and Mai—"

Azula snarls, disgusted by the traitor again, "You are very quick to turn your coat."

"I never loved Zuko. I loved _you_ ," Ty Lee whispers, still telling the truth. She does not know why Azula refuses to believe her.

"I am not talking about Zuko," Azula says, rolling her eyes at Ty Lee's apparent stupidity. "I am talking about Mai. She is about to give birth any day now and you would just run off with me."

"This time, I want to pick the right person." Ty Lee leans forward and kisses Azula, but the Dragon Queen pulls away. "What?"

"I am in fact married to a pregnant woman who also wanted to pick the right person a long, long time ago when I first took Caldera with my dragons. I think she beat you to the punch," says Azula, setting her hand on Ty Lee's shoulder to keep in control.

"Do you love her?" whispers Ty Lee, daringly meeting the Dragon Queen's gaze.

"No, but I would not sink to her level. Or _yours_ for that matter," quietly but forcefully replies Azula, pushing slightly on Ty Lee.

"Okay, then, no betrayals, no schemes, no coat turning," Ty Lee says. "I'd follow you no matter what. I'm kinda in love with you and I know we don't have a good relationship but why don't we just have. . . _this_. It doesn't matter if you want Mai or even love her or have that. We could have us. . ."

"You are a horrible person," Azula says breathlessly. "Kiss me."

Ty Lee does, but she starts with her neck. She lowers her lips to Azula's collarbone and then to the top of her breast. She rises again and cautiously kisses her lips—she still is sore from minutes ago being bitten.

Once bitten, twice shy.

Azula pushes her down onto the floor. This might mean nothing, but it is what she wants and she was promised everything she dreamed of. And she did always dream of this. The spirits could never blame her.

Ty Lee kisses the woman on top of her. She very hesitantly slides her hands to Azula's hips as she grinds against her.

Azula's fingers brush across her body.

"Do you love me?"

"Yes."

"Recant it all tomorrow."

"Yes."

Azula kisses her neck.

The night is perfect.

 ** _###_**

The next day, still glowing, Ty Lee stands in front of a court. A court that includes the spirits, which terrifies her. At least she is not in their world, or so she hopes. Other people of Azula's regime stand around. Ty Lee hears Ryzu breathing.

She silently says goodbye to everything she used to have. Things change. Ty Lee knows that.

Azula asks regally, her voice resonating through the packed room, "Do you recant your previous ways and treasonous acts against my empire."

Ty Lee hates herself, but she replies, "Yes. I recant my beliefs and words. I promise myself to the Dragon Queen."

It means more than what the others in the room would assume. Azula turns to Mai, who has three days before she will have her baby on the burning altar. She has loyalty to her wife and child more than she does to a near-perfect lay.

"Good," Azula purrs, then suddenly switches tones and fixates her gaze on the buff guards. "Put her in the dungeon with my brother: _Immediately_ , as I command."

Ty Lee does not fight the soldiers the drag her away, but Azula confuses her.

She thought recanting would save her.

 ** _###_**

Azula lights the grungy hallways blue as she walks down to the dark dungeon. She reaches Ty Lee and steps inside. She had Ty Lee's hands chained and so hopefully that will prevent any chi-blocking incidents.

"Why did you turn against me?" Ty Lee whispers, her face puffy from ugly tears.

"I wanted you to recant to clear your name," Azula purrs. "But you are a danger to my family, don't you understand? That baby dragon means more to me than you ever could."

Ty Lee closes her eyes. She has no more tears in her to shed.

Then she looks up at the girl illuminated azure.

"You're beautiful," says Ty Lee when Azula visits her in the dank cell.

Azula clenches her fist. More pathetic platitudes that make her want to strangle her past-crush to death.

"I conquered the world," Azula snarls, tired of the petty compliment. "I am going to _kill_ you, and therefore I doubt you believe me to be beautiful."

Ty Lee coyly smiles. Azula cannot, for the life of her, understand why.

"Just because an unstoppable force is coming to destroy me doesn't mean I can't pause and admire its beauty."

Azula averts her eyes.

 ** _###_**

With Zuko and Ty Lee in the dungeons and Mai sleeping on the other side of the palace, Azula stands before a counsel of spirits, shadows of black, white, green, red and all other imaginable hues. Yet they all seem wreathed in darkness, out of place in the mortal world.

The shape-shifter who trained her during her coma leads this table of the spirits who chose her to lead their vengeance. She—or perhaps he—sits with translucent hands clasped.

And that sensei states, "It is buried under Ba Sing Se."

" _What_ is buried under Ba Sing Se?" Azula snarls, risking her life. She does not care at this point. Their demands become increasingly vaguer as time passes.

"If you knew, you would act unwisely and with too much human passion."

"Then I imagine it will hurt me. Why would I seek something that will hurt me?"

"The opposite, Dragon Queen, _but_ your human emotions are so irrational. They call you mad for a reason."

Azula's eyebrow twitches and her face flushes from fury.

"I have proven myself," says Azula. "I have earned your trust and I ought to be allowed to make a few decisions about my— _our_ —empire. After the birth of my child tomorrow, I will find an appropriate team to accompany me. The conquest needs to stretch further; that much is clear to me now. I took Ba Sing Se once and I can easily take it again."

"You want to conquer. We want what is in the Crystal Catacombs."

"I will go myself," Azula states cleanly, glancing between the spirits.

"You are needed here."

And Azula swiftly retorts, "Caldera is broken and obedient. I want to do this myself, and I want to select my soldiers and my lieutenants. I've lost touch with what made me great and powerful; give it back to me."

"You are too important."

Azula rebuts, "I am important because of how capable I am at conquering and winning wars."

The silence echoes.

"If that increases your power, so be it. We must make plans."

Azula conceals her smirk, but her eyes knowingly glint.

She has her opportunity.

 ** _###_**

Azula runs her palm across Ryzu's sleek blue scales. He has grown so much and she could not be prouder of him. And, now, he will be integral to this ritual. Azula knows how prepared he is; he was born to resurrect the rest of his kind.

Dragons will reign over the Earth again.

Azula adjusts the gem adorning her neck and asks Mai, "Are you scared?"

Tugging at her embroidered silk sleeve, Mai replies, "Not really."

"How?" Azula asks, in genuine surprise.

Mai says earnestly, "Well, I try not to care about many things and so I fairly often just think to myself that, if this is how I die, this is how I die. Like when a raccoon-rabbit snuck in through my bedroom window but I was too tired to do anything about it."

"Sometimes I wish I were more like you." Strange words from the Dragon Queen's lips.

They stride beautifully side by side, atop the ceremonial path seared into the ground. This once was a lively courtyard but now it surrendered to the ashes like everything else in Caldera. The altar matches the one of the Sun Warriors in as close of detail as Azula could manage.

She is pleased with her work.

She is concealing her nerves about this birth going awry.

Azula watches from the outside this time. She has a few fleeting thoughts about how dragon blood might have been the only thing that protected her, and that Mai will have none, but she knows this is more important than a decayed friendship.

The fire burns, Ryzu creating such beautiful colors with his flames. They make bright, stark blue look like boring orange in comparison.

Mai does scream.

Azula does not feel a single twinge of guilt over it.

Because, out of the wild flames and escalating crowd, Azula sees the outline of small swings, a shadow against Ryzu's bold inferno.

The world is on fire again, and it is so beautiful.

A second _living_ dragon takes its first breath and screeches a warbling war cry to the unforgiving shadows.


End file.
